Abstraction
by AvaMcKenna
Summary: I don't know what I'd expected. A village or an open field. I'd at least expected to see the sun. That must have been why I was stunned speechless. I was sure of one thing, though: We were definitely not in the Earth Kingdom anymore. Blackout SEQUEL
1. BUTTERFLIES

**ab·strac·tion **/æbˈstræk n]

–noun

1. apart from concrete realities, specific objects, or actual instances.

2. an impractical idea; something visionary and unrealistic.

3. the act of taking away or separating; withdrawal

4. secret removal

_**Origin: **_  
>1540–50; LL abstractiōn- (s. of abstractiō ) separation.<p>

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**BUTTERFLIES**

_"Hush, little baby. Don't say a word,_

_and never mind that noise you heard._

_It's just the monster under your bed._

_It's in your closet. It's in your head."_

_._

"It's raining."

I stared through the wild and dangerous downpour at Kaida, who stood just a few feet away. She had said it so calmly, so evenly, that I had almost not even heard her over the pounding of the typhonic storm. She looked sideways off the deck and up at the offending sky, then slowly back to where I stood, partially covered by the doorway, as if asking my opinion on her comment. Somewhere behind her, lightning cracked the sky, splitting the clouds that covered it.

"Very perceptive," I replied, my voice equally as controlled as hers'. The shadowbender's emerald eyes flashed.

"Nothing good ever happens when it rains," she explained, gazing up at the overhanging clouds once again.

"I didn't think you were superstitious," I answered, still trying to fathom why she had to be standing out in the rain to know that it was raining in the first place. The lunatic had been out on deck for at least an hour, now, and it would take just one badly placed wave to sweep her into the ocean, stick that she was. My right hand twitched as I considered reaching out into the sheets of rain and pulling her back inside. Kaida raised an eyebrow comically.

"I'm not being superstitious," she argued, resting a hand on her hip. "I'm being analytical."

"You're being an idiot," I decided. "You should come inside before you catch a cold."

The shadowbender stuck her tongue out at me, but stepped inside the stairwell anyway, dripping all over me and the floor. I wondered idly what she planned on changing into, since she only owned that one outfit and refused to wear anything of Azula's. Kaida shook her head, rainwater flying from her obsidian hair. I put a hand up to shield my face half-heartedly.

"Where's Iroh?" Kaida inquired, tilting her head sideways and ringing the water out of her hair. The liquid hit the metal floor with an almost musical sound as she looked up toward me for an answer.

"Already asleep," I replied. The sun had set at least an hour ago. It had been a hard day for Uncle, so I'd volunteered to take over for him while he got some rest. Kaida nodded, straightening back up.

"Ehh, I'm going to bed too," she decided, stretching laxidaisily. "Rain makes me tired." I rolled my eyes, walking beside her as she headed toward the room. Just as usual, Kaida treated standing on deck in a near-hurricane like a drizzling walk in park. How predictably unpredictable.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

"Will you stop playing with the light, Kaida?" Zuko demanded from his bed in the corner of the room. "I can't sleep with oversized fireflies circling my head." I looked over at the irritating firebender to find that he had the pillow pulled over his face. He looked stupid.

"The solution is simple, Zuko," I told him solemnly, wondering if maybe he was trying to smother himself; put an end to his own self-inflicted misery. "Stop trying to sleep." Zuko groaned loudly, flipping over onto his stomach as I blatantly ignored him and continued to shadowbend. I twirled the light around my head in a kind of celestial dance, making different shapes and figures out of it. The soft glow of the light soothed my monsoon-induced headache and cleared my muddy thoughts.

I had wondered, at first, if maybe the calming sound of a light rain would ease my tensions. As it turned out, the intense storm had only served to make them worse, but once I was out there it was next to impossible to leave. The play of light and dark just fascinated me; the blinding streak of the lightning as it hit the ship. I could have stayed out there and watched it for hours. If it hadn't been so close to killing me, that is.

"Mhhp thdddb nrr mhh-hn."

"Take the pillow off your face, Zuko," I said, rolling my eyes as he pushed himself off of his face, leaning on his elbows heavily. He gave me a not-very-amused look as I bent a silvery ring of light over his head like a halo, then started laughing.

"Why don't you sleep at night?" he asked again, his tired voice cracking. Spirits, he overworked himself. "You're always tired during the day because of it." I frowned.

"No, I'm not," I denied automatically, stringing the halo into a glowing ribbon in front of Zuko's face. He waved his hand through it lazily, causing the ribbon to dissolve like smoke. I pouted as the amusing night light dissipated, quickly forming another one a safe distance from the tempermental firebender. Zuko raised an eyebrow at my remark in disbelief.

"You fell asleep at the market place yesterday," he reminded me, watching my new self-made lamp distrustfully.

"Pfft . . . pssh," I sputtered defensively. _Smoooooth_, remarked a sarcastic voice inside my head. I wasn't very fond of that voice. "Yeah, well, maybe if you and Iroh hadn't taken so long at the supply shop and left me at that comfortable table in the square, then I wouldn't have fallen asleep," I offered half-heartedly, crossing my arms as if offended. It was a terrible excuse, and I knew it. He could tell that something was wrong.

Zuko gave me a dull look, apparently thinking it best if he just didn't respond at all. I trailed my stream of personal sunshine absently around my pinky finger, wondering what the young prince was thinking. He simply watched me in silence, the crease between his eyebrows growing more and more pronounced by the minute. I wove the delicate beams of luminescence through and around each other, like thread, encasing my wrist first, then threading them around each individual finger.

After a few minutes' silence, I was almost convinced that Zuko had finally managed to fall asleep. Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, he sat bolt upright, making me jump at least a foot off my bed, narrowly avoiding falling onto the cold, iron floor.

"Kaida," he spoke alarmingly, his eyes huge.

"What?" I returned, my freaking out entirely his fault. He ogled at me, his mouth hanging open stupidly; seemingly shocked into silence. What had he seen?

"You're . . ." Zuko's voice trailed off distantly, as if he just couldn't find a way to form the right words for what he had to say to me.

"What?" I demanded again, really getting unnerved. His inability to speak was making me more and more jumpy by the second. "I'm what? Spit it out, princess!"

"You're . . . afraid of the dark," he sputtered uncharacteristically, completely cracking up.

I stared across the room, mortified. If his accusation hadn't made me so angry, the fact that Zuko was actually laughing so hard would've been amusing. I growled, clenching my teeth and glaring at the prince. How _dare_ he say such a thing? I was a _shadowbender_ for pete's sake! Emphasis on the 'shadow' part. What kind of sense did that make?

"I'm not afraid of the dark," I said, my voice strong, though I was admittedly lying in a truthful kind of way. That made no sense at all.

"Uh, huh," Zuko answered, the smirk on his face making my blood start to heat up. Out of pure instinct, and in attempt to make him shut up, I shadowbent all the darkness out of the room for a split moment, causing a bright flare. Zuko let out an annoyed hiss, rubbing his eyes in response as the light stung his vision.

"Crazy woman, trying to blind me," I heard him mutter under his breath as he glared at me. I returned the look with ease.

"I'm not afraid of the dark," I repeated, quieter this time, but considerably more threatening. "I'm just . . . afraid of what's _in_ it." I stared the floor down, refusing to make eye contact with Zuko. Who knew what sort of smug things he would say after-

"What are you afraid of?"

I looked up distrustfully. His expression seemed genuinely confused, now, betraying no hints to the previous amusement that had left his eyes. I hesitated momentarily. I still hadn't found the right opportunity to tell him about the shadow beings. Maybe this was the chance that I'd been waiting for. I bit my lip uncertainly but decided to enlighten him.

"Just trust me in the fact that I've seen much more of the shadows than you ever will," I assured the young prince, not wanting to fling about too much information, too soon. No reason for _both_ of us to have nightmares, after all, I decided. "There are things you can't see. Things you don't _want _to see."

There were hints of actual concern in Zuko's eyes, now, as he realized exactly what I was saying to him. I had never told anyone outside of my family about my little "shadow world" before, save for Iroh. I gauged his reaction silently, silently vowing not to say anything else unless he asked me.

"Things I can't see . . ." Zuko repeated hoarsely. "What exactly do you mean by that, Kaida?" I paused, trying to organize my thoughts. How could I possibly explain this to him?

"You know how the air nomads used to have flying bison, and their air bending was the only reason they could work them?" I asked experimentally, praying my history was at least partially accurate. Zuko nodded, so it must have been. "Well, for shadowbenders - or, me really - there are creatures that only I can see." My words were slowing down as I tried not to sound too much like a mental patient. "Other people can see what they do to the surrounding area, but can't control them."

"So, what you're saying is that there could be something attacking you and no one could do anything about it?" I grimaced. Bingo, sparky.

"Trust me, Zuko," I said bitterly. "If something from the shadow world has found a way to be attacking me, we're dead anyway." Zuko frowned; probably at my apparent lack of optimism.

"Why is that?"

"As far as I know," I answered casually, still trying to decipher why he hadn't asked me if I'd lost my mind, yet. "The only thing that's ever gotten rid of the shadow beings is my bending."

"Good to know," he muttered darkly, pushing himself off his cot and standing up. I watched with interest as the young prince sauntered over to my bed and sat down next to me, an unconcerned expression on his face. I arched one eyebrow in question, internally wondering if he was a lot more exhausted than I thought he was.

"Um, no offense, Zuko," I said cautiously. "But, what the heck are you doing?"

Zuko fell backward onto my bed, putting one arm behind his head. Despite the fact that he was clearly lying as far away from me as the tiny piece of furniture would allow, I still couldn't ignore the fact that Zuko was on my bed. It kept nagging me in the back of my mind, refusing to leave me alone. He lifted his free hand, fire springing up from his palm. I watched carefully as he twirled the embers in between his fingers distractedly.

"Hmmph," he started evenly, closing his eyes. "Since you're not going to let me sleep, I might as well keep you occupied." I was about to ask pointedly what exactly he meant by that little comment, but he answered my unspoken question before I could put a voice to it.

I sucked in a breath as a butterfly made entirely out of flames appeared in Zuko's palm. It lifted off from his open hand, beating it's blazing wings as it flew circles around me. The golden flames danced up and down it's body, creating an ever changing pattern that had me mesmerized. It reminded me of the first time I had learned to shadowbend. Entranced, I lifted my hand to touch the fiery insect, completely forgetting what it was made of.

"Don't even think about it," Zuko murmured, grabbing my forearm before I could burn myself, even though his eyes were still closed. What the-? Well, that was strange, I thought, leaning down over Zuko's seemingly-unconscious form, studying the young prince closely to see if he was peeking. He wasn't.

"Kaida, quit staring at me," he said, a few of his words slurred together with exhaustion. I quickly looked away, somewhat unsettled by the fact that he knew I was watching him with his eyes closed, but just shook my head.

"I wasn't staring at you," I contradicted halfheartedly, turning my attention back to Zuko's butterfly. I successfully kept my eyes off the boy on my bed, but with much more difficulty than I would have liked to admit to myself.

"Liar," he murmured sleepily.

"Don't flatter yourself, Zuko," I grinned, creating a butterfly out of my own element, though it was not nearly as good as Zuko's. Mine did not move as much like a real butterfly and every now and then it would become slightly transparent.

"You're just special," I told it in a voice that I normally reserved for small children and house pets.

"What did you just say?" Zuko asked me, sounding a more than a little concerned for my mental state.

"I wasn't talking to you," I said bluntly. Apparently, the prince knew well enough not to respond when I said something odd. Oh, well. It wasn't any of his business, anyway. I could talk to nonliving things if I felt like it.

I shifted my pathetic excuse for a butterfly around the room, noticing that the further away I sent the apparition, the less visible it became. I turned to see Zuko's eyes open again, though he looked incredibly tired. He watched my sad attempt at shadowbending as it flew crookedly around us, looking slightly injured and more than a little mentally challenged.

"You don't have to stay awake with me, you know," I reminded him. "I'm a big girl. Seriously." By the morning, he would be dead on his feet if he didn't sleep, and, although it would be hysterical to screw around with someone who likely wouldn't even remember any of it later, it would not be helpful for travel. We kind of needed him to help guide the ship, since Iroh wasn't feeling well.

"With my luck," he muttered drowsily. "You'll disappear into some shadow the moment I fall asleep." Zuko held one finger out and I let my butterfly land on it, though not as gracefully as I was going for. Poor, stupid butterfly, I thought.

"So," I responded slowly, my voice amused. "You're afraid I'll disappear?" He turned his gaze toward me, looking a bit irritated. That was a 'yes,' Zuko style. I grinned.

"Eh, don't worry," I instructed, easily brushing off any concern. "As long as I can shadowbend, they'll never be able to get me. Nothing's going to happen."

Of course, that was before I found out that I was dead wrong.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**A/N: Yays for a Metallica quote, eh? Man, I am too proud of myself about that. I've had this chapter written out since I first started Blackout. I just never knew where to patch it into the story. I went a little fluffy, so I hope it isn't too out of character.**

**Also (THIS IS IMPORTANT) if anyone on here hasn't read Blackout, then you probably should. This is the sequel to that story, and you will be confused if you're just reading this and not the first part. **

**Anyhoo, let us all hope that Kaida's butterfly get's some help, yeah? Read&Review! Srsly.**


	2. THE LAWS OF THE UNIVERSE TAKE A DAY OFF

**A/N: Be sure and tell me what you think!**

**THE LAWS OF THE UNIVERSE TAKE A DAY OFF**

_"Some say the world will end in fire;  
>Some say in ice."<br>- Robert Frost_

I drifted in and out of consciousness, my head swaying like we were still on the ship as the entire market undulated. Spirits, I hated going with Zuko and Iroh to restock on the ship's provisions. I honestly couldn't figure out why I even went with them anymore. All I did was wait around and fall asleep in public, which was frankly something that I could easily do on the ship. I leaned heavily onto my palm as I considered staying behind in the next port city.

I sighed. It wasn't like they needed me there anyway. The vendors usually helped them load the supplies onto the ship themselves, making me virtually useless. I thought about Zuko's comment on my lack of sleep the night before. I was getting way too obvious about it. I normally slept during the day - or at least, I had when I'd been living on my own - but, now that my days were occupied with other things, I was forced to sleep during the night time, like a normal human being. Frankly, after being more or less nocturnal for almost four years of my life, my body and mind hadn't quite adjusted to flipping it around like that.

I gazed up at the offending clouds as suffocating sheets of rain barracaded the waterproof cover of the outdoor tea shop I was waiting in. It wasn't pouring violently, the way it had been last night, but the rain was continuous. I was no weather oracle, but there was no way that the torrential downpour was going to stop any time soon. Even the animals seemed to have noticed the strange behavior of the skies, because I couldn't locate a single one walking around anywhere. The birds had stopped twittering.

Deep inside my pocket, the obscene amount of money that Zuko had given me that morning clinked loudly every time I bothered to move. Apparently, the prince had come to the conclusion lately that I could entertain myself by going out and buying something of my own while they picked up provisions. Of course, every time they came back, I returned the same amount of gold I'd started off with when they left. Normally, I was either too tired to go out shopping for useless things, or I just wasn't interested.

Still, I considered, maybe going and walking around town would keep me awake for the time being. Zuko and Iroh didn't need another reason to worry about my physical state, which was exactly what they would do if they came back and found me passed out at a table. Again. I stood up, weaving through the clusters of empty tables and chairs as the salesman watched me leave, looking deflated because I hadn't bought anything.

If I hadn't already been soaked from the walk into town, then I would have been drenched the moment I stepped out from under the tarp covering the tea shop. The rain on my face was soft, but nonstop. It was a feat trying to keep the water out of my eyes, so I had to slip quietly into a vendor's stand every couple of shops I passed. One of them happened to be a clothing stand, and I quickly bought a rain cloak.

Half the stores were closed, due to the harsh weather, but the ones that were open sold anything from carmine apples to new parts for ships. It was easy to figure out why these port cities were such popular places to stop. With so many different people coming in from all over the world, there probably wasn't anything that they didn't sell out there.

At one point, I must have strolled into a weapons shop. The walls were lined with swords, daggers, wooden katana; everything I'd ever had to fight against, and then some. I pulled my hood off from over my dripping hair, browsing the expanse of items.

"Good morning," the salesman greeted, then added, "Well, kind of." I smiled, nodding at him. "Something for your warrior?" I smirked internally. More like my inner warrior actually, but I kept that to myself.

"Yeah," I answered, bending over to examine a case of black and purple throwing knives, then straightening back up.

"Anything in particular you're looking for?" the salesman inquired, stepping from behind the counter. I bit my thumb nail, considering that. Well, I supposed it was high time I gave Zuko his dagger back. Sure, he didn't really care if I used it anymore, but to be truthful I had kind of been wanting my own.

"If you have any daggers I could look at," I replied hopefully, wondering if I was being too obvious.

"Of course," the vendor said, leading me to a crate pushed up against the other wall and removing the lid.

I stooped onto my knees to get a better look at what was inside. About seven or eight newly-polished daggers sat in order from smallest to largest inside the chest. I reached inside, pulling out a medium-sized one with a white grip. It was lightweight, and still shone, even in the cloudy light filtering in through the open tent flap. The salesman knelt down next to me as I examined the blade carefully, turning it this way and that. After a minute, I was satisfied.

"How much for this one?" I asked, holding it up for him.

"That one is fifteen gold pieces," he answered, straightening back up and helping me up as well. I frowned slightly, considering informing him that I was capable of standing up on my own, but decided against it. "Would you like it?"

"Yes," I answered, almost smiling. Normally that price would have made me pass out, but stupid Zuko had given me twenty times that amount like it was nothing. The perks of being a prince, I supposed.

The salesman wrapped my new blade up in a thick beige cloth, then placed it into an ornate box before handing it to me. As he placed it in my hands, I half-wondered how much of the high cost had been to pay for the packaging. Oh, well. I couldn't feel guilty about buying it, especially when I hadn't had to use my own money. Zuko wouldn't notice if just a little went missing.

I thanked the vendor, exiting the stand and grimacing up at the sky. Still raining. I pulled my hood back up, sticking my package as far under the cloak as it would go as I began to walk back toward the tea shop.

I only got a few feet wen, suddenly, the building to my left exploded, leaving a gaping hole in the side of the wall. I shielded my face with my rain cloak as wood and debris flew across the road, almost knocking me over. All of a sudden, the wind seemed to whip harder, cutting across my face and blinding me. The few people who were out on the street screamed, yelling things about freak lightning and earthquakes. While the remaining villagers sprinted off, I stayed put; unable to move. This couldn't be a weather accident; there was no way.

Just moments after the first, there was another crash as the entire remaining section of the building collapsed in on itself. I coughed at the dust that flew up off the ground, despite the fact that it was still pouring mercilessly. Lightning whipped the sky above me, followed by the loudest clash of thunder I'd ever heard. Or, at least, I thought that it was thunder until the actual thunder sounded, and a shadow creature stepped out from what remained of the destroyed building.

I couldn't breathe.

I had seen shadow beings, but I had never seen anything like this one. While most of them were no more than a mass of shadow, with maybe a pair of eyes and a set of teeth thrown in there, this one had a clear, definite shape to it. In fact, it looked almost canine. It had a curved tail, feet with razor claws on them, and - if I looked closely enough - I could almost make out the blue-black, raven fur coating its body.

But that wasn't all. This shadow creature was by far the biggest I'd ever come across. For one to cause damage to something was normal, but for this one to be capable of taking down an entire building - that was insane. The thing looked around the deserted, empty street, its vermilion eyes seeming to glow in the cloudy light of the evening. I let out a breath that I'd only just realized I'd been holding. It spotted me then, clawing the dirt and crouching low to the ground.

I held my breath in again, but I might as well have been screaming. The monster raised its enormous head, then charged straight for me. I acted on reflex, bringing up a light sheild in front of my body. The shadow being stopped, but for some reason it didn't turn and run. Instead, it came up slowly and sniffed my wall of light as I slowly backed toward an alley. It couldn't get past my shadowbending - or, at least, that was what I told myself. That was all about to change, though. Instead of stalking back the way it came at the sight of my bending, the shadow creature did the thing that had only ever happened in my darkest nightmares.

It took its foot up and stepped right through my light shield.

I didn't stick around to find out what the creature planned to do next. I took off down the alleyway without another thought. For a moment, nothing happened, but then I began to hear the sound of the monster growling again. It sounded just like thunder. The rain pelted my face as I ran, stinging my eyes and soaking me to the core. I couldn't stop, though. I had to get out of there. I had to find Iroh and Zuko.

My head reeled. I had no idea what was going on. The thought of a shadow being that was able to get past my bending was pure madness. That little spark of hope and safety - the assurence that I could at least fend for myself in some way - was suddenly shattered. It was what I had relied on my entire life; the reason I hadn't gone completely insane with paranoia, trying to make sure the monsters didn't end up tearing me apart the second I fell asleep. What was that all worth, now, if I couldn't defend myself?

The odd-looking shadow being, the storms, the failure of my bending . . . It was all throwing me for a loop. There was something crazy going on here - something deeper - and I needed to get to the bottom of it before it got me first. I closed my already-useless eyes, running headlong into the windblown downpour. Spirits, where were my stupid firebenders when I was about to die? Honestly, they were always around when I didn't need them, but the minute something happened, I-

"Watch out!"

"Ooof!"

I ran straight into the cabbage cart that Zuko and Iroh were standing at, knocking it over and spilling the vegetables out into the street. The owner of the stand yelled something at me, then fell onto his knees and began sobbing into the pavement. I reoriented myself, pulling my hood back up, taking both men by the arms and practically dragging them into the nearest store. They both protested, but I yelled at them to shut up, slamming the door behind us as we entered.

Once inside, I flipped my hood back out of my face, then stooped over and began to unwrap my dagger. I was going to need it, and it wasn't exactly convenient to carry it around an expensive and heavy package.

"Kaida," Iroh began, watching my hurried attempt to undo the ties. "Is s-"

"What's the matter with you?" Zuko cut in, sounding put out. I threw the empty box off to the side, tucking my dagger into my belt loop and handing Zuko his own back mutely. He took it after a moment of hesitation, still glaring through his sable bangs at me.

"We have to leave," I answered curtly. "Now. I can explain everything later, but for-"

I was cut off as the roof caved in, and the rain met my damp face once again, threatening to drown the entire world within the hour. The saleswoman of the store we were in took off out the back door in alarm before I even got a decent look at her. The lightning flashed again, and the shadow creature appeared through the void in the ceiling. I pushed Iroh and Zuko back to the door.

"Go! We have to get back to the ship!" I yelled, frantically pulling the entrance open. The three of us ran through the now-flooded streets of the port town, and the rain had picked up so much that it was nearly impossible to see an arm's length in front of my own face.

"Kaida, what was that?" Zuko yelled through the chaos beating down all around us.

"A shadow being," I answered with as much volume as I could manage while running. "Like the ones I told you about last night." A blast of thunder nearly ruptured my eardrum, and I had to close my eyes for a split second. The city was a ghost town, now, completely devoid of both people and animals for what seemed like miles in every direction.

"I thought only shadowbenders could see them, though," he answered.

My blood turned to ice and my lungs felt frosted over. There had to be a mistake, I thought, my eyes fixed on the prince in alarm. We kept running for the ship, but it seemed so slow, now; like the torrential rains had finally managed to put the town completely under water. I was about to do something; maybe stop or ask Zuko if he was lying. I don't know. I wouldn't ever find out exactly what would have happened, because at that moment the shadow creature intercepted us.

Its charcoal form leapt out into our path, snarling and baring its silvery teeth. The monster took a step forward, and in response all three of us took a step back. I felt like a ten-year-old again; small and helpless. It was like I had been sucked back into my early childhood, when I didn't know how to bend, and the shadow beings were the monsters under my bed that nobody believed were really there. The creature growled, the sound rumbling from more than just inside of it.

"Kaida, what are you waiting for?" Zuko called over the rain and growling and thundering. "Shadowbend."

"But, I . . ." my voice faded away. Zuko was staring at me; waiting. Iroh was behind him with the same expression, except for the slight panic that was on his nephew's face, but not his own. Despite the doubt in my own mind, I managed to conjure up a sheet of light in between us and the monster. Just like last time, it simply gazed at the glowing pane for a moment, then stepped through and continued to encroach on us.

"Agni," Iroh muttered in disbelief.

My heart spasmed. He could see it, too? What was going on here? Had all the laws I had managed to compile over the years about what could and couldn't happen in my insane, little world of shadowbending just gone out the window? As it turned out, I never had time to ponder that question, because before we could get another inch away from it, the shadow being reared up on its back legs and lunged straight for my throat.

I blacked out.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**A/N: Read&Review!**


	3. KAIDA GETS AN INTERESTING NEW LOOK

**A/N: Hey guys! Just FYI, we're getting pretty into the last month before our big regional competition at my dance school. Updates may or may not be a little bit later, but no worries! I'll keep writing either way!**

**P.S. Is it wierd that getting yelled at by my readers cracks me up? Haha, I have the best readers ever.**

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**KAIDA GETS AN INTERESTING NEW LOOK**

_"Firefly, the flame grows inside.  
>The heat causes my skin to become transparent,<br>and gauzy. You can almost touch me.  
>It colors me as all becomes apparent."<br>-Meghan Fields; "Firefly"_

I was underwater.

There was an immobilizing kind of cold all throughout my body; and not like the sort of cold you get when you visit the southern water tribe. It went far deeper than that. I couldn't have been freezing from the outside. This was totally different. It was like the ice was creeping out from the very center of my body. I couldn't escape it. I couldn't get away.

I had no idea where I was. Not that I normally knew where I was, anyway, but it was a crucial fact. I also found that I couldn't tell whether my eyes were open or not, because - regardless of what I instructed my body to do - they were useless in picking up on anything but pitch black everywhere I looked. My feet moved as if I might just run away from this place, but there was nothing under me; nothing holding me up, or down, or wherever I was. There was only darkness, pressing in on me; making my head pound slowly.

My body seemed to twist forward. My muscles were just aching to shadowbend, and I couldn't stand the uncommunicative blackness any longer. Far away from where I was - or, so it seemed - a distant fleck of light appeared. It was so small, just a mere pinprick, but I was suddenly aware of my eyes again. I could once more pick up on space and distance. It was like I had gone from being nothing to existing again.

Something was strange, though; or, something other than the blaringly obvious fact that I was underwater, in the middle of empty nothing. The little point of light seemed to spread out, like the luminous speck was dissolving as someone was slowly turning the lights on. The only way that I could think to describe it was a sunrise - the way that it would slowly fade into daytime, even if I didn't notice it actually happenning.

It was all fine at first, but then the light kept growing brighter. Even with the resistance to light that I'd acquired as a shadowbender, it was difficult to tolerate the incinerating level of brightness that was now all around me, and these rapid spikes and drops in temperature were going to send me into enviornmental shock. Soon, it got to the point that I couldn't even keep my eyes open, and the heat of it was rapidly searing my skin. I still could not do anything, though. My body blatantly refused to move.

So, I just sat there in the middle of empty space while the murderous light melted me.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

It was an odd feeling to go from drenched - from absolutely sopping wet - to completely dry and normal, like Uncle, Kaida and I hadn't been about to die in a monsoon. That was the first thing that I noticed upon regaining my consciousness.

The second thing was that I couldn't see to save my life. I could hear Uncle breathing and Kaida mumbling something uninteligible a few feet over, so I knew they were _there_, but my eyes were doing nothing for me. I squeezed them shut, trying to think past the dark. Lighning flashed inside my head as I remembered what had been happenning; or, more importantly, what I'd _thought _was going to happen. The storm replayed itself in my mind, and I saw the horrifying image of the shadow creature, its silvery, canine fangs somehow glinting in the scant amount of light from the sky.

I could have sworn, though . . . I could have sworn she'd said that only shadowbenders could see them, but, if that was true, then why had it been clear as daylight in my vision? I pondered that for a moment, thinking back and remembering the Kaida's reaction. She had seemed horrified at my words and hadn't answered me when I'd asked her that same question, and, if I'd had to guess, I'd say that she wouldn't have had an answer for me anyway. Maybe none of us really knew what was going on.

I groped around on the rocky floor, running my hands along the ground until they met a soft lump of material. I gripped the thick cloak, listening as the obnoxious snoring stopped and the person in front of me began to move. Shuffling sounded through the shadows, and I heard someone cough sharply at the dust that seemed to coat the unlit room. There was still no light coming from anywhere, though, so I could only guess at the fact that it was Uncle that I'd managed to awaken. The old man's voice through the empty space confirmed it.

"Zuko, is that you?"

"Yes," I answered, still on my hands and knees. It sounded like he was, as well.

"Are you alright?" I sniffed indignantly. He _would _pick that as his first question.

"I'm fine," I answered shortly, peering forward.

"Where is Kaida?" he quizzed, moving on.

"I'm not sure," I muttered, moving my fingers over the ground again, trying to locate the girl.

Suddenly, it dawned on me that I hadn't thought to firebend. I clenched my fist, hoping to spark up a small flame - not much; just something to burn a little light through to wherever we were. I stared into the darkness where my hand should have appeared, but nothing happened. My body temperature didn't even raise a fraction of a degree. I narrowed my eyes, trying once again to ignite a fire. Still nothing.

"Uncle," I began, unsure what was going on.

"I know," he replied solemnly, and I could tell by the sound of his voice that his mind was already racing. "Something seems to have blocked our bending. We will have to find another way out of here."

"Blocked our bending?" I repeated dubiously. "Like Ty Lee?" My fuzzy memories conjured up the distant image of a cheery friend of Azula's who'd had a particularly annoying talent. Suddenly, I had the distinct, unwanted notion that I was missing a part of myself, and I couldn't help but feel uncomfortably helpless. I might even have slipped into a kind of internal panic if Uncle hadn't caught my attention right then.

"Maybe," he said in an unsure tone, snapping me from my internal downfall. "I can not be sure, yet. First, I think we should find Kaida."

I huffed in agreement. Even though this new lack of bending was, if nothing else, setting me on edge, I knew that I had to push that aside for later. Right now, the main priority was getting our entire group back together. Moving further away from the sound of his voice, my hands the only things keeping me grounded, I began to steadily make my way across the rocky enclosure. It would be all to easy to get lost in there if we didn't find some way of seeing. I wasn't claustophobic, but the idea of being trapped in there with no light and no way out still succeeded in making my stomach turn.

My arm suddenly bumped something strewn across the floor. When nothing happened, I pushed it lightly, then a bit more forcefully.

"Mmm . . . bright . . ."

I scoffed. That was Kaida, all right. I carelessly shoved what I assumed was her shoulder; a move that, on anyone else, would have had them wide awake and yelling at me. All I got out of Kaida was a slight shove back as she continued to stay fast asleep.

"Hey," I hissed, leaning down even more. "Get up."

I must have been a lot closer to her ear than I'd guessed, because the shadowbender sucked in a sharp breath, her body stiffening where she was on the ground. I backed off a bit once she was conscious, listening closely as her urgent breathing died down and wondering how such a soft demand could wake her up after I'd tried practically beating her awake. After a minute, there was the sound of someone sitting up.

"Huh," she murmured in vague surprise, along with more shuffling. "I'm dry."

"I don't want to know," I announced before she could say any more. With the sort of thing Kaida's imagination was capable of, spirits knew what had been going through her mind a minute earlier.

"You should want to know," she informed me calmly. "It's a pretty interesting story."

A light from Kaida's finger expanded like a balloon, filling up my vision. My eyes ached momentarily, adjusting to the unfamiliar sight and the sensation of being able to see again. I let out a bitter, twisted sigh in relief. At least one of us could bend. That meant that we had a chance at finding our way back to the ship, somehow. Of course, it also pointedly reminded me of the nauseating fact that I was still incapable of firebending.

Brushing the feeling aside, I pivoted around, finding Uncle and helping him stand up as well. He blinked rapidly, focusing up at the ceiling. We appeared to be in a cave of sorts. Everything above our heads was a deep blue stone or luminous crystals that almost seemed to glow in the dark. In fact, now that I really thought about it, my very skin seemed to be glowing ever so slightly.

"Guys," Kaida began dryly somewhere out of my field of vision. "Not to bother you both and your admiration of the ceiling, but where on earth are we?" I shook my head, turning around to face her, a reply already rolling off my tongue.

"Don't you think that if we kn-"

My sentence stopped short, and it was all I could do to keep from choking on the unspoken words. I blinked several times, as if doing so might change the image in my eyes, and I was even tempted to have Uncle pinch me . . . or slap me across the face, because there was either something terribly wrong with me, or something terribly wrong with Kaida.

Everything about her was exactly the same as it had been before. She was still considerably short, still wore the same clothes that she always did, still had that characteristically bored look on her face. Even her new dagger was positioned right on the left side of her belt; exactly where she had left it. There was just one, little thing, though:

Her hair was white.

Every last, short strand of hair on Kaida's head had changed from her normal, coal black to the purest white. Uncle's hair was white, but this was something else entirely. Her normally-obsidian locks weren't the kind of silver that people got when they aged. They were almost like the color of a pearl or the inside of a shell and seemed to glow faintly in the dark. In fact, looking at her now, the girl seemed to be unnaturally transluscent; even moreso than Uncle or I.

I quickly turned to examine Uncle, only to find that his appearence hadn't changed in the least; including his hair color, and everything else about him. His amber eyes met mine, and for once I could see surprise in them, but with no answer or explanation. He pressed his lips together, looking back toward Kaida. I did the same, completely at a loss for what to do. The shadowbender, who had turned away from us, glanced back at us over her shoulder, looking as if she didn't know whether to be worried or irritated by my inability to complete an answer. The small motion made her icy hair glimmer faintly.

"If you what?" Kaida prompted, spinning the rest of the way around. There was no question in my mind that I had begun to stare. Uncle must have as well, because Kaida started to fidget. Her eyes slid back and forth between the two of us, demanding to know what was stopping us from answering her. "What's with the dumb expressions, you two?" I could tell by her voice that she was trying to come across as uninterested, but there was a slight shake in her tone and her eyes told me she was worried.

I couldn't answer her. How did you just go about telling someone that their hair had mysteriously changed color while they were passed out? Or, more importantly, how did you go about telling that to _Kaida_? I wasn't sure whether she would get angry, or go on the defensive, or what else. Her reactions were always so difficult for me to predict. But, at the same time, how could I not tell her? She was eventually going to find out regardless, and spirits knew what she would do to get back at me if I actually let her walk around like that without knowing about it.

"Your hair-" I started lamely, immediately earning an annoyed huff from the shadowbender, who crossed her arms indignantly.

"Listen," she cut me off, refusing to allow me to finish explaining myself. "This isn't really the best time to be worrying about my hair, alright? I'm sure it looks terrible, but-"

"Kaida," Uncle intervened gently, visibly determined not to irritate her further. "I don't think you understand what-"

"We're trapped in a cave, and all you two are concerned with is my hair?" she cut in, her voice laced with disbelief.

My patience ran out with Kaida about right then. I sighed sharply, stepped closer to her, and gently pulled a lock of her hair in front of her face, where she couldn't possibly not see it. Her mouth immediately popped open, but this time no sound came out of it as her face a mask of some emotion that I couldn't quite define. She reached up deliberately and took the strands from my fingers, as if to make sure the sight was really there in front of her. I let my hand drop, and Kaida's emerald eyes had suddenly darkened as she spoke again.

"What's going on?"

Those were the only words she spoke, and her voice was low, now. I thought through it for a moment. I'd heard stories about the princess of the northern water tribe, who was supposed to have hair the color of snow from some kind of spiritual contact. Somehow, I doubted Kaida had had any chats with the spirit world lately, but what could possibly explain what had happened to her? Things like this didn't just happen. I said nothing, noticing that her eyes weren't the only thing that had just gotten darker. The light she had shadowbent into existence seemed to have started to dim. It was more difficult to see her face, now, than it had been just a few minutes earlier.

"That is what we need to figure out," Uncle explained in his inexplicably controlled tone.

"We can't stay here, though," I intoned. Kaida bit her lip for a long moment, until I was almost positive that she was going to draw blood from it, then slowly she nodded.

"Let's go, then."

After staying right next to the wall of the cave and making our way almost the entire way around, we finally managed to locate something of a tunnel. It was only just taller than me, and it was uncomfortably narrow, but it was the only thing we could find other than going straight up, which wasn't going to happen. We were either going to risk the tunnel, or we were going to stay there, and the right decision was painfully obvious. There was no choice.

We somehow all managed to squeeze into the claustrophobic tunnel, but it was still unnerving to be able to touch both sides of the thin passageway at the same time. Though I tried to keep my mind off of anything particularly stressful while we walked, I still began to question what we were doing. What if the trail came to a dead end? Then what would we do? Or what if the space got so small that Uncle or I couldn't fit through it? And then, there was the growing worry in the back of my mind: what would we do when Kaida's light continued to grow weaker and weaker? It was bound to eventually go out, and then we would be at the mercy of the dark. Finally, I had to ask her about it.

"What?" she blinked at me, apparently unaware that there was something wrong with her bending, then turned to the light. Her hands trailed casually to the side in what I recognized as a shadowbending movement, but the brightness didn't alter. The crease between her eyebrows became more pronounced as she attempted the movement again, this time more aggresively. There was still no response. I was sure she would have stayed there and tried it several more times if Uncle hadn't specifically instructed her to keep moving and worry about it later.

I can't remember how long we walked for. It had to have been for hours, because my legs started to burn, and we occasionally had to slow down for Uncle to catch his breath. The tunnel never got smaller, but the disappearing light guiding our way seemed to create the illusion that it was closing in on us. After what seemed like far longer than we used to take trekking through the forest, the waning light finally faded out and threw us into complete darkness.

Kaida stopped moving the second the illumination was gone, causing me to run into her from behind. The walkway was deathly silent before she spoke up.

"Zuko, give me your hand."

My brain didn't actually run through that statement until a second or so had gone by, so my first, automatic instinct was to oppose the instruction. It was only after I realized _why_ she'd asked me to give her my hand that my head stopped racing. I reached out in front of me, relying solely on the sound of her voice to discern where she would be standing. I caught what felt like her arm, then moved down, locating and holding onto her ice-cold hand. I wouldn't have admitted to it, but the action shot my body temperature up a few degrees.

"Uncle," I muttered, reaching out behind me and finding his hand through the darkness as well.

After taking a minute to adjust to our new, more painful positions, we began to walk again. We moved slowly, now; more cautiously, as if with the dark had come some other kind of danger that had not been there when we could see. The further we went into the tunnel, the cooler the air became. Eventually, it got to the point that I could actually feel a draft flowing up from somewhere at the far end of the pathway as the almost frigid air burnt my nose. Once or twice, we would come by another one of the strange, glowing rocks that had been way back at the beginning of the cave, but they only allowed for us to see for a short while. Other than that, the rest of our walk was blind.

It seemed as if we had been walking that tunnel for years when I caught my first glimpse of the light. I didn't care much at the time, but there was something very strange about the color of it. Something about the light at the end of our tunnel seemed artificial; didn't seem real, but that wasn't something that I was incredibly concerned with at that moment. Kaida began to walk faster, pulling at my hand. Ever so slowly, the exit grew to something that was undoubtably real.

I could definitely see it, now. It wasn't an illusion; I was positive of that much. I still felt like my legs were about to give under my weight, and I could only imagine how Uncle must have felt, but I knew that I had to keep walking so that we could find somebody to help us; to explain where we were and all of the odd things that had been happening to us.

I don't know what I had been expecting. A quiet, little village maybe, or a calm forest way out in the countryside. I knew that I had at least expected to see the sun. That must have been why I was so stunned by what I saw, looking out of the mouth of that cave. There wasn't a whole lot that I could have explained right then, but there was one thing I was positive about:

We were _not_ in the earth kingdom anymore.


	4. FINDING OUT YOU'RE NOT CRAZY

**A/N: What? An update? *gasp* Yes, I'm actually updating this story! Haha, sorry, guys. Busy week or so for me, considering I was actually supposed to put this chapter up last Saturday. I won't make a habit of it, though! I swear by all that is holy that chapter five will be out two Saturdays from now. Mark my words and hunt me down if I don't follow through.**

**FINDING OUT YOU'RE NOT CRAZY**

_"Wings grow warped with heat and patterns melt together.  
>Your hues fade into darkness and your heart is lost forever."<br>-"Firefly" by Meghan Fields_

You would think that after all the crazy things I'd seen in my life, nothing else on earth could possibly have stunned me beyond speech the way I was when I looked out of the mouth of that cave. After everything I'd been through and all the places I'd seen, the image imposing itself upon my eyes should have been just like any other. After all, if I could handle hiking through a space-invading tunnel for hours on end and finding out that my hair liked to switch tones, then anything else that happened to me should have been no big deal. But it _was_ a big deal, and this sight had just topped all of that.

My first concern was that it was so far away from where we stood, but that didn't change the fact that the underground city nearly blinding me. I felt as if I was standing on the top of a mountain, overlooking an impossibly steep valley. Our cave let out at some kind of cliff; right into the wall of the most enormous cavern I had ever laid eyes on. Just looking out into it was making me dizzy. Similar to the cave we had woken up in, the rocks were all stained a deep blue, like the color of the raging ocean during a storm or the sky right after the sun dipped past the hills. The ceiling and walls of the cave were speckled with the glowing, crystalline rocks that made the entire cavern seem to shimmer.

If I'd thought that the view looking up was amazing, though, it was nothing compared to what could be seen below us. Way down at the bottom of the colossal, stone enclosure, a city completely lit up by something that even I did not understand sat nestled at the bottom corner of the valley. It was like the one, luminous point of light in the far reaches of the world; the only thing visible in the all-encompassing shroud of darkness everywhere else. The glow of it held my attention like a moth's, and I was suddenly and inexplicably incapable of looking away from it.

I couldn't pick out many distinct details, but there were a few things that were obvious, even from miles away. One was that I somehow got the feeling that it was populated. Sure, it was definitely too far off for me to be able to say for sure whether or not there were people living there, but something was telling me that there were. It was the way the entire city seemed to glow with . . . something. I just wasn't sure what it was, yet. It was also very apparent that the buildings down there were all of pure white material. I had never heard laid eyes on any stone that was such an odd color, but something about it seemed naggingly familiar to me.

From where we were, it looked minuscule, but up close I was sure the city was enormous. It was just so far away from us, I had no idea how we were supposed to get to it. Even if we weren't about to collapse from exhaustion, the luminous city was at least an hour walk from where we stood. And we _were_ about to collapse from exhaustion. I turned to Iroh and Zuko, who were only just starting to collect themselves as well.

"We're going to have to stay here for the night, aren't we?" I asked, already deflated over the answer I knew I was going to get. There was no way that we would be able to get any closer to the mysterious city; not in _that_ condition.

"It is probably best if we take a short break from walking," Iroh confirmed, obviously noticing my reluctance to stop moving. "Just to give us all a chance to rest for a bit before we move on." I sighed, taking another longing gaze toward the city, before the old man added, "Don't worry, Kaida. It's not going anywhere."

After a considerable amount of effort on my part to pry my eyes away from the valley, I finally turned to my traveling companions so that we could set up for the night. Of course, with no actual view of the sky, it was difficult to discern whether it truly was night or not. I internally wondered when the next time I saw the sun would be, and my stomach tightened ever so slightly at the thought that it could be a lot longer than any of us expected; that was, if we _ever_ saw the sun again.

"Here," Zuko said, shoving one of his dirty shirts into my face and bringing me out of my morbidly negative speculations. "All of our tents and supplies are on the ship back in the earth kingdom. You'll have to sleep on this."

"Lucky me," I mumbled.

Some two hours later, I realized that I would probably end up thanking Zuko for his ridiculous habit of wearing far to many layers of clothing than was really necessary. The rocks littering the cave floor were practically drilling holes into my back, and regardless of my irritation I knew it would have been a whole lot worse if I hadn't at least had something to rest my head on.

I hadn't fallen asleep; not even for a wink. Not only did I have the floor of the cave puncturing my spine, but there was also a whirlwind of questions getting all tangled up inside of my head. That, and the fact that I simply wasn't tired, kept me wide awake while Iroh and Zuko slept. I was impatient. How could anyone decide to stop for the night after seeing that city lying at the bottom of the cavern the way it was, just waiting for someone to make their way to it? The image of spotless white was stuck in my mind, and, for the life of me, I couldn't put my mind on anything else.

I was so anxious, now, that I could literally feel my heart pounding into the ground where my back was pressed flat to the floor. Slowly, I drew myself up, making sure not to disturb anyone else as I steadily got to my feet. I only needed to move a bit closer; just enough to get a better look at the elusive view. That was what I was repeating to myself, anyway, as I stealthily made my way down the diagonal path toward the city. The dark stone under my bare feet was cooler than I expected, and a sudden shiver rattled my spine as they made contact with the platform just below ours'.

Every step toward the city seemed to make it glow brighter, and I eventually got to the point where I could pick out a few details; the ivory rooftops of a couple of the bigger houses, the glass dome of the largest building that sat in the very center of it all. After I felt like I'd gone as far as I could manage without getting caught, I dropped to the freezing ground, content to sit there for a little while. I'd strayed far enough, anyway, and it wouldn't be fun if I got spotted; by the people I knew, or the people that I didn't. So, I just stayed there.

It really was a beautiful sight; the city, the lights, the glimmering cave. Even in such a tight, chaotic situation I could appreciate that. I thought back to the streets of the port town and being chased down by the shadow being. With everything going on, that was still one mystery I needed to solve. Was it possible that the creature had forced the three of us into this unworldly place? Were shadow beings even capable of doing something like that? It sounded insane to me. Everything was so disconnected, though, that it was impossible to tell what had happened. One minute I'd been face to face with the monster of shadow and the next I'd awoken to Zuko and Iroh in complete darkness, with no idea where we were or how we got there. There was nothing connecting one event to the next, and it didn't make thinking through the situation very easy.

And what about Zuko and Iroh being able to see the shadow being? There were certain truths in my life - rules that, through years experience, I had managed to prove within a reasonable shadow of doubt to be true - and one of those truths was that _no one_ could see shadow beings but me. And, not just that, but every single time in the past neither Iroh nor Zuko had been able to see the creatures I constantly fended off. There were even times I'd had to deal with one right in front of them, and not once had I gotten any indication that either of them knew a thing.

Maybe it was just some freak occurrence, like a mutation or abnormality. I could live with one shadow being like that in the entire world. What I was really worried about was if there were more like it out there; or - worse - rather than the shadow beings changing, the possibility that my bending was failing me. It had never just not worked like that. Even when I had just learned how to shadowbend and had no idea what I was doing, it had still _worked_. What use was my bending if it couldn't keep the shadow beings at bay and away from the people I cared about? I would become nothing more than a lamp; a torch. No. I absolutely did not like the idea of losing my safety net, especially in some place that was foreign to me. I would figure out how to get my bending working for me again no matter how long it took me.

After waiting for a while in that spot, though, I decided that it would probably be a smart idea to get back up to our 'camp' before anybody woke up and found me _not_ there. I could continue my quest for an answer back up the cliff, anyway. I let a sigh slide out from between my lips, using my palms to push myself off the rough ground and dusting myself off. Being so worn out, I supposed that my senses were a bit . . . duller than I was used to them being. It wasn't something I liked to admit, but it did explain why I hadn't noticed anything out of place before. It was only when I was halfway through pulling myself back up the rock face behind me, that I noticed the person fifteen feet above where I had been sitting.

Watching me.

For one horrifying moment, my brain forgot to tell my hands to stay latched onto the cliff side, and I nearly tumbled back down. Even after catching myself, though, I knew in my heart that I would not have an easy time getting my muscles to move for me again. It wasn't so much the fact that there was somebody there that was bothering me; it was the fact that I _recognized _them.

I would have remembered that shock of white anywhere by that point. It was the shadowbender I'd seen so long ago; the one who I'd never thought I would see again. Their hair was covering their face the exact same way it had been the last time, but almost the second I spotted them up on the ledge, they looked up. The movement tossed their bangs out of their light, almost silver eyes, and I could almost instantly tell that it was a _he._ The shadowbender's face quickly became a mask of surprise, as if he'd never imagined that I'd see him up there.

He stood easily on the spot, watching me for a moment before turning reluctantly away, his baggy, white outfit swishing as he did, and it was then that I found I could work my arms again. I hurriedly heaved myself the rest of the way up, practically tripping over myself as I broke into a dead run after him. All I could think was that there was no way this guy was going to get away from me this time. I would corner him if I had to. He had answers, and frankly those answers were the very thing I'd been searching for my entire life. He'd slipped away from me once. He was not about to do it again.

I suppose I should have seen it coming. The moment I took off, the shadowbender's eyes widened, and before I could even get a decent foothold he had flung himself off the other side of the rock face and clean out of my sight. I continued to run to the edge he had disappeared behind, thinking that no one could possibly have gotten away that quickly, but there was nothing. I stared blankly down the empty drop, my heart still racing frantically, and I was suddenly aware that it had all happened so quickly that I hadn't even had time to call out to him. I wasn't sure what I would have said to him regardless, but it still made me feel like I'd missed my chance.

Suddenly, I felt exceedingly self-conscious, like there was someone still watching my every move. What was I supposed to make of that? This was the third time I'd seen him - that shadowbender - and I still hadn't the slightest clue who he was or where he came from; or, more importantly, why he was following me. The first time was after I'd tripped in that earth kingdom shop, and the second time had been no more than a swift flash of white in the corner of my eye after we'd entered the fire nation.

This, however, this was no coincidence. It couldn't be one. For him to be down here in this underground world meant that this place was familiar to him. He was _from _here. But where was 'here?' What was this place, and why -_ why _- had I never heard of it. Even just trying to think through that was enough to incite a burning headache. Everything that was happening, it just kept on piling up, higher and higher. That, in itself, was enough to make me crazy.

Huffing irritably, suddenly fed up with my little walk, I hauled myself back up to the cave opening. The guys were still snoozing away, so I simply plopped down on my spot again, suddenly exceedingly annoyed with everything. There was a soft shuffling behind me, but wasn't interested enough to turn and see what it was.

"Do you ever sleep?"

I wanted to ask Zuko when he had so suddenly become concerned with my health and sleeping habits, but managed to settle on an answer that would be a bit less awkward for the both of us.

"Sleep is for losers," I muttered distractedly, biting my thumb nail. It was only then that I decided to turn myself around.

Zuko didn't say anything back, instead using his effort to sit up. His ember eyes were still hazy from sleeping so long, and his hair looked absolutely ridiculous, but for some reason the sight only distracted me from my other, clearly more important thoughts. Come to think of it, he had become very distracting in general lately. It was a bit worrying, to be honest. The prince looked back at me for a moment, seeming almost dazed, then suddenly turned to wake his uncle. It broke the momentary tension, but I was still very much distracted.

Iroh was a bit harder to bring back to the world of the mentally conscious, but after quite a bit of pushing and yelling the old man finally rejoined us, complete with his signature, goofy grin. Our camp hadn't really been much of a camp, so it took almost no time at all for us to pick up what still lay on the ground around us. It was probably the only perk that came with leaving all of your things on a ship that was most likely miles away.

Even though I knew that anyone in their right mind wouldn't make the same mistake twice, I still betrayed my better judgment by glancing around the cavern every couple of minutes. I didn't have do delve too deep to know that I was still hoping that the shadowbender had decided to hang around. I could still feel someone's eyes on me, and - no matter how hard I tried to brush it off as imagination and lack of sleep - I knew better than to doubt my perception skills. Sometimes, I didn't need any confirmation to be aware of something that I knew was happening. Sometimes, I just knew.

By the time we reached the hidden ledge that I had stopped at before, we had wasted more than twice the time it had taken me to get there by myself. Just like before, the temperature began to dip the tiniest bit. It wasn't like we were being frozen over, but the change was enough that my body subconsciously noticed it; even before I really did.

"What do you suppose we do if it turns out to be a society of cannibals?" I wondered out loud, not really paying attention to what I was saying, but rather just wanting to say _something_.

"We let them eat you first," Zuko answered, his voice equally as casual. I nodded distractedly before actually processing what he'd said, but by that time it was too late to say anything back.

"I'm sure the people who live here are very nice," Iroh intoned, bringing just a small hint of logic into our pointless exchange.

The white city was so close, now, that I could almost imagine the sounds that might be coming off the streets, or, that was, if the streets of this city were anything like the streets of the earth kingdom cities. Then again, we didn't know anything about this underground empire, so it was impossible to assume anything right then. The people could turn out to be just like the people in any other town, or they could be like nothing we had ever seen. Thinking back on everything we had gone through to get there, however, I was leaning more toward the assumption that they were _not_ like the earth benders I was so used to.

Up ahead, an unusually-shaped arch constructed entirely out of the white material that made up every one of the buildings inside of the city formed a sort of gate over the pathway. Our group gradually slowed as we neared the structure, giving me the chance to observe it. Judging by all the dirt and cracks, the arch must have been very old. I wouldn't have been surprised if the structure crumbled into white powder at the slightest touch. We were so close to it - nearly about to walk through - when a friendly, almost sweet voice called out to us.

"Whoa! I wouldn't walk through that!"

My foot scraped the rocky ground as I forced myself to stop moving and spin around in one movement. My eyes darted around the cave, automatically searching for the source of the voice that had halted us. The pace of my heart spiked and my insides were suddenly scorching as my eyes met a pair of pale gray ones, framed by tatters of ivory hair. It wasn't until the shadowbender jumped off from the ledge he was perched on top of that I finally connected the voice to him.

I didn't know what else I was supposed to do besides watch him as he gracefully approached us, smiling kindly the entire time. When he was uncomfortably within speaking distance, the shadowbender lowered himself into a friendly bow, his eyes trained on me the whole time. Zuko and Iroh each returned the gesture, but I was far too stricken to return anything but a disbelieving gaze to him. Zuko was now stealing glances at me as well, except he looked worried. The shadowbender must have taken the silence for a 'go on.'

"My name is Sora Aoi," he introduced himself, still smiling. "Welcome to the City of Light."

**A/N: Woooo! Mysterious shadowbender has a name! Read&Review!**


	5. SORA DOESN'T KILL US

**A/N: I lied. Or, really I forgot that I was going to be in Florida this weekend, so merry early Christmas. Also, for all whom it applies to, **_**be patient**_**. You know who you are.**

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**SORA DOESN'T KILL US**

_"In limbo between lies, you're tired of being itemized,  
>and somehow along the way, you lost the dream you visualized."<br>-"Firefly" by Meghan Fields_

There was an uncomfortably lengthy pause after this person, Sora, spoke. Uncle appeared to be thinking very hard about something, while Kaida looked suspiciously like she was either going to throw up or try and attack the snowy-haired boy. I was never one to speak anything past what was necessary, especially to someone I didn't know, but after neither of the others did anything it seemed that I had no choice.

"The City of Light?" I inquired shortly. Sora adopted a kind of embarassed expression as he ran his pale fingers through his hair. His _white_ hair. The same color that Kaida's had turned.

"Oh, right," he half-laughed. "You've never been to the city. We don't have many visitors. Here."

Sora hopped lightly off of the rock ledge he'd been dangling from, stepping around us and approaching the ancient-looking arch that he had warned us not to go near. Kaida stepped closer to me as he passed by her shoulder, and her eyes didn't once leave his figure as he went by. I wasn't sure why she seemed to be so wary of him, but the uncommon look of suspicion in her eyes was enough to set me on edge as well. She didn't normally act that way, and there had to have been a good reason for it. No one said a word as he moved, seemingly oblivious to the air of tension radiating off of us.

"You would have been able to get through here easily enough, Kaida," Sora explained in a conversational tone of voice, positioning himself directly in front of the arch. "But your friends could've gotten hurt." Beside me, Kaida let out a small gasp, her moss-colored eyes magnifying in alarm at something he must have said. Suddenly, it occurred to me that he'd used her name, and I was rapidly speculating. He seemed to at least know Kaida, and the way she was looking at him only made it seem more likely. Out of nowhere, there was a distinct, bitter taste in the back of my throat as I tried not to wonder how they knew each other, and I couldn't help but inch closer to Kaida as well.

Sora then turned to face the arch; head down, eyes shut, holding his arms out on either side. Somtehing was bothering me about the sight. There was an air that was very familiar about the position he was in; too familiar. But, before I could put my finger on it, he drew his hands together, and the arch was suddenly filled with a transluscent, white light; an _unnatural_ light. That was the moment everything snapped into place. The white hair, the mortified look on Kaida's face.

Sora was a shadowbender.

For a moment, I couldn't believe it. Kaida had never mentioned knowing another shadowbender. I had believed all along that she was the only one. Had she lied to me this entire time - I had no doubt that she would be able to keep something like that quiet - or had she not known, herself, that maybe her 'unique' style of bending wasn't entirely unique after all? Somehow, I doubted it was the former. Why would Kaida keep something so important a secret? Still, the recognition on the girl's face wasn't making sense with that conclusion. Finally, Sora let the glow fade away, then turned around to face us again.

"There,' he announced, grinning at Uncle and I. "It should be alright for you two to enter as well, now. I'm sure you all have questions."

**A-B-S-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

Sora didn't kill us. He didn't attack us. He didn't even turn out to be a cannibal. In fact, he was actually _nice._

"I don't think I'm the best person to explain that," he replied when Iroh had asked him why, exactly, there was a city in the bottom of a remote, underground cave. "When we get there, I'll talk to Rei. He tells the story way better than I do." We still had about fifteen minutes of walking to do before we reached the city, and Sora was definitely fit to keep us all occupied until we got there. I could already tell that much by the way I hadn't gotten in hardly a word since he appeared.

I was still apprehensive about the shadowbender, however, even with the likeable personality I hadn't expected him to have. He had particularly worried me when he'd known my name without even asking it. And regardless of his amiable character, that nagging, little fact was been enough to make me wary of him, no matter how kind he seemed to be so far.

"What did you do back there?" I asked cautiously; the first time I'd spoken up since he had appeared in front of us. "To the arch, I mean." The bender turned to me brightly, a grin lighting up his face, as if he lived to explain the workings of the world to us.

"I had to deactivate the barrier around our city," Sora explained, falling back into step beside me. "Only shadowbenders can get through safely. Anyone else would be physically injured and possibly sent back to the surface if they tried to walk through while it was on." Something inside me really disliked the idea of being separated from Zuko and Iroh at that point in time. Somewhere on the other side of Sora's shoulder, Zuko huffed at something I wasn't quite sure of. Come to think of it, he'd been scowling ever since Sora showed up.

"Okay," I replied, starting to relax and act like myself again. "So, why are we here in the first place? Did you . . . bring us here?" I leered at the pale shadowbender, waiting for an answer. Sora only chuckled slightly. Apparently he thought my caution was funny.

"No, I didn't bring you here," he answered, then his gray eyes became downcast and he was more thoughtful. "I'm actually not entirely sure how it happened. You had to have done it yourself, though. Only a shadowbender can transport themselves or others here." Sora paused then, seeming to consider something, then added in a small voice, "Well, most of the time . . ."

"Kaida," Zuko spoke in his stable tone; the tone that I relied on. I glanced at him around Sora's shoulder. "The shadow being," he reminded me meaningfully. I blinked. Of course. That was when it had happened. But it still didn't make sense. I hadn't intentionally sent us where we were.

"I don't even know what I did," I admitted reluctantly. "All I remember is that I really wanted to get us all out of there." Sora nodded, as if he understood completely what had happened.

"You probably did it on instinct without realizing what was happening," he confirmed, his bright eyes locking with mine appraisingly. "You must have been pretty freaked out if you were able to bring two other people as well. I'd have been passed out for a week if I'd tried something like that." Sora grinned cheerfully, as if he'd just given me a compliment on my bending. I looked at him dubiously, noticing the few points of light that he was unconsciously orbiting around his head.

"Are there others?" Zuko inquired quietly. "Other shadowbenders, I mean?" I frowned. There was a strange note in his voice, now; one that I couldn't quite define.

"Of course," Sora answered happily. "This _is_ a city of shadowbenders."

"You mean, there are more?" I asked incredulously, my attention focused solely on the words coming out of Sora's mouth. The shadowbender seemed to find my disbelief funny, because he smirked even more at my question.

"You bet," he replied easily. "Geez, I keep forgetting that you all have never met another shadowbender before."

I think he kept on talking after that, but I was too amazed to pay any sort of attention to him. It was impossible enough for me to wrap my head around the idea of _one _other shadowbender in the world, but now he was telling me that we were about five minutes away from an entire city of them? It was so far beyond my comprehension that I wasn't even sure I would be able to believe it if I was standing right in the middle of the city that very second, surrounded by them. It was like finding out that I had a hundred siblings my entire life that no one had bothered to tell me about.

Of course, there were still a million questions flying around my head. Why hadn't I grown up there? Why hadn't I lived there my entire life? Why had Sora physically shocked me our first encounter? These were all diluted, though, by the fascination I felt listening to Sora talk. He had become - not only the person _with_ answers - but the answer, himself. I found myself wondering what sorts of things I could learn from him. There must have been countless things about shadowbending that I hadn't even discovered, yet. Sora could teach me those things. It was perfect.

"Looks like we're almost there," Sora announced.

The shadowbender pointed to a sterling gate blockading the path ahead, guarded by two people. One of the gate guards was a girl with a long ponytail at the base of her neck and a streak of blue running through her icy hair on the side. She had a confident expression, and nodded to her partner when she saw us coming up the trail. The other was a bit taller, and his hair was about the length of Zuko's. He didn't have any streaks in his hair, but his solemn expression was partially covered by a shred of black coth tied around his head like a bandana. Both of them were deathly pale. Just like me. Just like Sora. We paused in front of them.

"You all stay here while I talk to these two," he instructed, grinning briefly and then dashing off to speak with the guards, his ivory hair ruffling as he ran.

"I'm not sure I trust him," Zuko said the moment Sora was far enough that he wouldn't hear him. When I tried to meet his eyes, though, I found that he was still leering at the shadowbender suspiciously. I blinked. That was new.

"Oh, yes," I answered shortly, looping my arm around his theatrically. "Sora is definitely out to get us. Just look at that murderous glint in his eyes." As if to drive my point home, Sora turned momentarily to grin back at us, flashing us a double thumbs up. I smirked back, laughing at Zuko's face as he did so. "Truly terrifying."

"You know you didn't trust him earlier," the prince argued, untangling our arms and crossing his own so that I had no chance of getting a hold again. "And besides, how did he find us where we were? He had to have been watching us to know that." I frowned, knowing that the point he was making was true, but not wanting to be out-argued.

"I only didn't trust Sora because he surprised me," I lied, sporting a cocky grin so I wouldn't be figured out. "Anyway, it was probably just his job to make sure no one went through the arch. That must have been why he was there."

"That still doesn't explain how he knew your name," Zuko replied seamlessly, his eyes boring into mine, now. I knew he was right, and I couldn't say or do anything about it. I felt like a small child being scolded, the way he was looking at me, and I instantly knew that I had no answer for him. I didn't have to, though, because thankfully Iroh chose that moment to intervene, once again bringing his endless logic into one of our logic-less conversations.

"Regardless of whether we trust Sora, we have no other option but to listen to him," the old man stated evenly, though his eyes were also on the shadowbenders at the gate. "Sometimes you must rely on someone other than yourself, and it is at those times that you just have to trust." Zuko deflated slightly at his uncle's blunt words, and I couldn't help but notice that Iroh seemed to have been on my side, for now. At that moment, Sora jogged merrily back over to us, putting a definite end to our little chat about him.

"Alright," he announced, waving us toward the entrance to the city. "We can go in, now. You all are going to love this." Sora's flippant attitude seemed to be infectious, and I felt myself getting excited as we drew nearer. The pair standing at the gate watched us approach with interest. As we came to a stop in the shadow of it, the two bent a light that formed a paper-thin veil which covered the entrance. When their hands dropped back down to their sides, I saw in astonishment that the silvery doors of the gate had vanished, leaving nothing more than an obstacle-free path straight into the city.

I exchanged a glance with Zuko, my eyebrows raising in surprise. The two benders stepped to the side after they completed their duty. Sora thanked them enthusiastically, waving us forward again with a flourish. As we passed through the silvery threshold, my heart began to pound, and - although I might just have imagined it - I could have sworn I heard the confident-looking girl guard mutter "Good luck" as I strode by.

Zuko seemed to move purposely nearer to me as Sora took the lead and directed us. Then again, maybe I was just making something out of nothing. Lately, I hadn't been quite able to figure out whether his attitude toward me was changing, or if I was changing. Perhaps it was a little of both. I still wasn't sure, but even so he had definitely gotten closer. That was something I knew I wasn't imagining.

After what I had considered to be far too much waiting since the city had come into view, we finally reached its outskirts and were stepping into the ivory empire for the first time. Sora took a deep breath, as if he found it refreshing to simply be there, and I could easily see why he would feel that way.

Strangely, the first thing that I noticed was how obscenely _clean_ it was. The stone-paved streets, the houses, the buildings. They were all perfectly unblemished; not a scratch or mark in sight. It had to have easily been the neatest city I'd ever been in. The bone-white structures that composed the city were violently illuminated against the sharp, black backdrop of the cave ceiling.

Once we were far enough into the city, I began to notice people wandering the streets. At first, ir was just a few stragglers every so often. Then, suddenly, I was surrounded on all sides by pale figures with ivory hair. Some of them had streaks of color blended into the white of their tresses, like the girl guarding the gate. Several had blue, while others sported tones like lilac and green. Every one of them was distinctly different from the next, but - at the same time - they were all similar. It was just like looking at a group of people all from the southern water tribe. Of course, they were all unique, but there were telltale features that marked them with where they were from.

"Are they all shadowbenders?" I asked Sora out of curiosity.

"Not all of them," he answered, falling back into step with me on my other side, since Zuko was not about to move from his place at my right shoulder. "It's like any other nation, I guess. Not everyone ends up a bender, but a lot of us are."

I nodded, for the first time considering the idea of another shadowbender, and, not just that, but one who could very well be better than me. I had always thought of myself as the best, since I had always assumed I was the only one. Now, with the discovery of tens - possibly hundreds - of other shadowbenders, it was somewhat odd to think that in their eyes I probably had the skill of a five year old beginner. I found myself almost instantly deliberating what else my bending was possibly capable of; what else I might be able to do with it.

Up ahead, there was a clearing sort of like a square in the center of the city. There were less people there, for one reason or another. A ring of elderly men and women faced each other over in the side of the clearing. A girl around my age sat on the marbled steps of a large building off to the side of the elder's meeting. A long, snowy braid cascaded down the center of her back, and she rested her head on her palm, as if bored. The elders seemed to be having an intense conversation, a debate even, but Sora didn't look incredibly concerned about the subject of their discussion, instead pointing to one of the old men standing on the far side.

"The man in the blue robe is Rei," Sora explained, watching the elder appraisingly. "He's the one who will be able to answer your questions better than I can. He can also explain the City of Light to you guys, so it makes more sense." I wanted to tell him that nothing on earth could possibly give this place any kind of sense, but held off on it for later. He wasn't accustomed to my sarcasm quite yet.

Just as he spoke his name, the man Sora had pointed out as Rei turned to the sound of his voice, a stern expression crossing his weathered face. He angled away from the circle counsel, as if he planned to openly scold the younger shadowbender in front of the entire square.

"Sora Aoi, I thought I told you n-" Rei's voice caught as his eyes strayed from Sora and found us. His gaze ran distrustfully over Zuko and Iroh's forms, but held onto mine, as a look of shock, then recognition tainted his features.

"Ah," he breathed; a confirmation of sorts, as his steely, gray eyes pierced mine, and there was no question he was addressing me. "I see you've finally managed to return, have you?"


	6. WE MEET THE GIRL WITH THE RAINBOW HAIR

**WE MEET THE GIRL WITH THE RAINBOW HAIR**

_"Along the way of becoming what you became,  
>Your love grew overrated.<br>Because of it, the flames heightened,  
>as you lost everything you cultivated."<br>-Meghan Fields; The Firefly_

"I see you've finally managed to return, have you?"

Kaida stared blankly at the harsh-looking, old man, and I was tempted to intervene and ask her how many people knew her that she'd never mentioned to either of us before. Rei's tone was expectant, as if to say, 'took you long enough, didn't it?' Something about the way he had spoken to her; I didn't like it. Kaida's lips stayed tightly sealed, and she shot the man a defiant look, while Sora's pale eyes widened in pure surprise.

"Rei," Sora complained softly, as if we wouldn't hear him if he was quiet about it. The two exchanged irritated glances; the first time I'd seen Sora without a ridiculous grin plastered onto his face. He quickly turned to us with a nervous laugh, his hands going up in front of him in apology. "He doesn't mean it like that, really."

"Yes, I do," Rei objected from behind him, his face the epitome of boredom.

"Rei!" Sora complained again, louder this time. Several others from his circle turned to see what was responsible for holding up their discussion, and the girl sitting over on the steps glanced up at the sound of Sora's voice, watching him intently. Finally, the old man sighed in - not defeat - but rather the lack of incentive to keep arguing. His hands disappeared into his long sleeves, and he rolled his eyes; something that looked slightly odd done by a man at least as old as Uncle.

"Fine," he answered curtly, motioning the others to continue speaking. "What do you want from me?" Rei's tone was sharp and would have been offensive to most other people, but Sora's grin only brightened at the intimidating old man, who was glaring at him like he was the biggest nuisance in the world.

"You know why I need you," Sora answered cheerfully. The elder adopted a slightly nauseous expression and seemed to remember something distasteful. Sora only chuckled under his breath at the look.

"Yes, I suppose I do," Rei replied knowingly, his tone dismal. "We wouldn't want you explaining it wrong, as usual." He sighed again, as if he did not enjoy doing whatever it was Sora wanted him to do, his eyes straying to the other side of the square. "Let's go somewhere more inviting, though. If you're going to force me to do this, then I want it done right."

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

Rei's 'somewhere inviting' wasn't far from the square. He knocked loudly on the door of an average sized house with copious amounts of black smog coming out of the vent at the top of the roof. It was a strange contrast with the clean sterility of the rest of the underground city. There were a few internal crashes and breaking sounds as whoever was in there tried to make it to the door, causing Rei to groan loudly. He pressed two pale fingers to his temple, eyes slipping shut for a moment.

"You'll have to forgive my niece," he explained strainedly. "She isn't always the most gentle person." Sora snickered knowingly beside me.

The door flew open, and a mountain of smoke came pouring out of the house as a girl staggered through the doorway, coughing loudly and waving a piece of cloth around in an attempt to blow the smog out. Once the sable ash had almost cleared from the air, the girl in the entrance removed the bandanna from over her face, and Iroh, Zuko and I were simply unable to look away.

Rei's niece was around Leila's age - about twelve or so - but that was where the normalcy ended. While a few of the shadowbenders in the city had maybe one colored highlight in their hair, this girl's messy, white cut was streaked with at least five different tones, giving her a bright and wild look. Apart from her multihued hairstyle, the girl also donned a pair of seeing glasses and an expression to match her unamused uncle's. She stood there in the doorway with her hands on her hips, while ash-colored smoke continued to billow out of the house.

"You really pick the worst times to mess up your little experiments," Rei informed her in a bored tone. The girl opened her mouth to speak, but he cut her short. "No, I don't want to know what that crash was."

"Hey, you took me in," she replied, her tone almost dull enough to match her uncle's, except for a slight kookiness. "You've got no one to blame but yourself."

"Of course," Rei answered sarcastically, followed by a slight pause between the two as they locked gazes. Finally, his niece spoke.

"I didn't catch anything on fire, if that's what you're wondering," the girl sniffed indignantly.

"Yes, I'm very sure you didn't," Rei replied, sounding for all the world like he didn't believe her for a moment. The girl's iron-shaded eyes then fell to us, but - unlike Sora and Rei - she didn't seem the least bit surprised to find two firebenders and a shadowbender she'd never seen before. She simply raised her light eyebrows a fraction, then kicked the door open the rest of the way and motioned us all inside.

Rei shadowbent a spherical light into a metal contraption in the center of the dark room that looked somewhat like a beaten-up lamp. When he dropped his hand, however, the light remained; trapped inside the strange lamp-like object. I stared perplexedly at the light-harnessing contraption until I felt Zuko's hand brush my side distractingly, which he probably thought I wouldn't notice. Rei's niece walked to the far corner of the room, picking a random rag from off the floor and wiping a smudge of what looked like soot from off her cheek.

"Come," Rei said evenly, leading us to a bunch of mismatched chairs, all set up in a ragged kind of circle close to the floor. We sat in dead silence for a moment as Rei lit up another one of his shadowbending lamps in front of us, and there were more metallic, banging noises from a back room. It seemed that Rei and Sora were waiting for the girl with the rainbow highlights to join them.

"Thank you for inviting us into your home," Iroh said good-naturedly, ever the calm one. Zuko and I nodded in agreement with him, and I wondered where we would get without the general's people skills.

"It is our pleasure," Rei replied in an obligatory tone of voice, then turned to his niece with an irritated huff. "RB, I hope you realize that everyone is waiting for you to come over here and introduce yourself, so I can get on with this explanation I'm being forced into."

Something about the old man's words gave me a guess as to what kind of people Rei had to deal with on a daily basis. He had the barely-tolerant tone of voice that I sometimes heard my grandmother use when she was particularly annoyed with someone. Rei's niece slowly sauntered into the sitting circle we were arranged in, crossing her pale arms and stopping in front of her uncle with an unamused expression.

"Don't be so stuffy, Rei," she offered, unconcerned, dropping into the seat next to Sora and adjusting her glasses. "I'm Rimatsu Bouta, but everybody just calls me RB."

"She's the city's mad scientist," Sora intoned, earning a sharp elbow in the ribs; courtesy of RB. "Hey, just kidding!"

"Would you two try and discipline yourselves for the next hour or so," Rei demanded dryly, rolling his eyes once again. "If that's even possible for you."

RB huffed, scooting away from Sora, who laughed lightly in apology and nodded. They both folded their hands in their laps then, showing Rei that they were going to be silent while he spoke. Rei sighed at the floor before bringing his eyes back up to scan the three of us, sitting in his dim living room with absolutely no idea what was going on.

"Well," He began steadily. "I suppose I should start at the beginning, then; the _very_ beginning." Rei's hardened eyes shifted from one face to another one last time, before he took a deep breath and finally dove fully into his story.

"I presume you all know of the avatar, and that I won't need to explain _that_, correct?" Iroh and I nodded, but Zuko merely closed his eyes, silently bowing his head. Of course we knew about the avatar. Even a homeless, trainwreck like me could recite the entire story by memory without even stopping to think.

"Most of the people alive today, however," Rei went on, "Do not know this, but there wasn't always an avatar." Zuko stiffened and my eyebrows shot up at this. Iroh, however, nodded in familiarity. Rei continued. "There was another time when all the nations were separate entities. Constant fighting was a part of daily life, and there were so many wars going on at one time that it was impossible to distinguish any one from the other. Chaos and insanity were the only thing that reigned in those dark times. It did not take very long for the violence to escalate to the point where - if nothing was done - the five nations of the world would have undoubtedly destroyed each other without hesitation.

"Now, as is usually the case with such things, the beings of the spirit world began to take notice. You see, although they had scant concern for what happened to the humans, their world was also being destroyed along with humanity. The spirits felt that they had no choice but to intervene. Unlike the humans, however, they understood that more chaos on their part would only hurt the earth even more. So, five spirits - ocean, moon, sun, earth and wind - devised a plan to bring peace and quiet to the world, once and for all.

"The spirits believed that if they could send a human into the world - one being who could live amongst them and have an understanding of _all _of the different nations - then this person could bring the peace that they were unable to attain themselves. To accomplish this, however, the spirits needed the consent of the humans. They would have to volunteer one of their own, or the spirits would not be able to go through with their plan.

"So, each spirit went to the leader of one nation to speak with them of their proposal. The ocean traveled to the water tribe, the sun to the fire nation, the wind to the air nomads, the earth spirit to the earth kingdom, and the moon to the city of light. They each had a job: to convince their own nation to agree to take part in the creation of a universal peace keeper; the creation of the avatar."

"So, that's how it all began," Zuko mused quietly beside me. I had to say, it was easy to see why the spirits had done what they had. With the avatar mysteriously missing over the last hundred years, the world was already on the brink of collapse. Even I had heard stories about it here and there; about _why_ the entire world was trying to kill each other.

"Yes," Rei confirmed, continuing his story. "The earth, wind, ocean and sun spirits all succeeded in their tasks and convinced their four nations to partake in the plan, but it was then that they ran into trouble. The emperor of the City of Light - the ruler of the shadowbender's nation - was a stubborn man and did not trust the other nations. Even when the moon spirit came to him, he refused to have anything to do with the avatar plan.

"Now, you must understand, the moon spirit - before she and the ocean gave themselves up to this world - was not a passive being. She was strong and commanding, and she became angry with the emperor's refusal. She told him that he had no choice but to cooperate with the other nations. When he continued to object, she threatened him. She told him that if he did not agree to her conditions, she would rid the world of the entire race of shadowbenders. The emperor once again refused, and the moon spirit was not forgiving."

"What did she do?" I questioned intently when Rei paused for a moment and very slowly took a sip of tea.

"The moon spirit sent all of the shadowbenders into a world of darkness; separate from the rest of the earth," Rei continued darkly, his storm-cloud eyes slipping closed for a short moment. "Though they could bend light to see, they did not know how to get out of the prison of shadows that they were trapped in. So, instead of trying to escape, the shadowbenders - now free of the treachery of the other nations - built a new City of Light while the five spirits created the world's first avatar, permanently cutting the shadowbenders out of the cycle and out of all known existence."

"Why?" Zuko began, sitting up straight; like a prince. "Why doesn't anyone out there know about this?"

"I wouldn't say that," RB answered evenly, pushing her glasses up and blowing a strand of multicolored hair from her face. "There are a few out there who still know about us, but we have to be careful and monitor those people who do; _very _carefully." A devious expression crossed the young girl's face as her eyes fell on Iroh with interest. "Your friend here would know a bit about that, yeah?"

"Uncle," Zuko breathed, astonished. "You knew about all of that?" Zuko and I watched the old man intently, waiting for an answer.

"I've heard a few stories now and again," Iroh answered warmly, his voice catching on familiar, secretive tones.

"Wait," I interjected, leering suspiciously at Rei. "If the moon spirit trapped the shadowbenders in here, then how did we get _in_? And why did I see _him_ out in the fire nation a few weeks ago." I pointed expectantly at Sora, who let out a nervous laugh, blushing furiously. Rei narrowed his gray eyes at the younger shadowbender, who shrunk slightly under the elder's intimidating gaze.

"Well, I can't say exactly _why_ he was there," the old man answered dangerously, "But over the years we found our way in and out of the shadow world, one way or another - and with much help from my niece."

"Your niece?" Zuko asked, and we glanced at the girl with the odd apparel sitting next to Sora.

"Some - like you - have gotten in and out of here by accident, but I was the one who figured out how to transport others through purposely," RB informed us casually. "It's not that hard, really."

"I wasn't kidding about RB being a scientist," Sora reminded us, merely grinning at her annoyed glance. "She can't shadowbend, but she makes up for it by knowing everything."

The multuhued shadowbender said something snappy back at Sora, beginning another argument, but I was too busy trying to break through the weight of everything I had just learned about these people - about _my _people - to notice. For the first time in my life, I wasn't Kaida, that weird girl who didn't really belong anywhere. For once, I wasn't Kaida, the world's only shadowbender. I had a city. I had a nation, for crying out loud, and they had been there all along. I'd just needed to find my way there. It was the one time in my life that I'd ever been happy not being one of a kind.

"What I don't understand," Zuko began, snapping Sora and RB from their debate, "Is, if you all know how to get out here, why don't you leave?" Suddenly, Sora, RB and Rei's faces all darkened inexplicably. Sora was suddenly very tight-lipped, and RB looked away from our prying eyes. It was Rei who finally put an answer to Zuko's question.

"About sixteen years ago, one of our shadowbenders left the City of Light with the hope that the world had changed," the elder explained darkly. "By the time she discovered that there was a war going on, she had been caught and killed."

"Oh," Zuko muttered, his eyes falling on me with an expression of apology. I looked back at him, very quickly touching his shoulder and shrugging. We both knew who had killed that shadowbender, but he didn't need to feel guilty about it. It wasn't his fault.

"Our people have been shown over and over again that power only leads to corruption," Rei explained resignedly. "That is why we don't have an emperor anymore in the City of Light. Instead, we are governed by a group of elders with enough experience to make rational decisions."

"Those people you were meeting with," I guessed.

"Yes," Rei confirmed. "Speaking of which, I should probably get back to them, now. Would you three mind waiting outside for a moment while I speak to Sora about where you will stay?"

Zuko and I shrugged at each other while Iroh bowed and thanked Rei once more, then led us single-file through the front door. The moment we were outside and had shut the door, I slipped around the side of the house and over to the cracked window, listening through the opening into the house, trying to hear what Rei _really_ wanted to talk to Sora about. Zuko peeped around the side of the building, motioning his hands in a what-are-you-doing kind of gesture. I silently shushed the prince, waving him over next to me. We both pressed our ears close to the window.

"Sora, what were you thinking, bringing them here?" Rei's steely voice chided through the opening, hushed and impatient.

"I didn't bring her here, Rei," Sora defended himself. Zuko scoffed quietly. "From the way she explained it, she did it herself."

"But to be able to bring two others with her?" RB's distinctive tone sounded. "Even I would have trouble doing that."

"I don't like the idea of two more firebenders in the city," Rei reasoned slowly. Zuko met my eyes, now interested, and mouthed the words 'two _more_?' I shook my head, shrugging. I couldn't be sure, but it definitely sounded like Rei meant that there were _other _firebenders down there.

"I've seen the old man before, just because he knows more," RB started, unsure. "But I've never seen the other." Zuko fidgeted next to me.

"If it makes a difference, they both seem trustworthy to me," Sora offered.

"Everyone seems trustworthy to you," Rei countered dryly, then continued before Sora could speak again. "Whatever the case, they need somewhere to stay. You know the group of empty houses on the north side, correct?"

"Yeah," Sora answered.

"Just open up one of those for them to use," Rei instructed. "And make sure to tell me which one later, alright?"

I probably would have remained there at the window and gotten caught, if Zuko hadn't grabbed my hand that very moment, practically towing me back to where Iroh stood at the front of the house. The retired general raised a silvery eyebrow at us but thankfully didn't question. Not a second later, Sora stepped cheerfully out of Rei's house, his gray eyes bright; something I was beginning to get used to.

"Well," he grinned, "Time to find you guys somewhere to stay."

**A/N: I'm so proud of my made-up avatar legend 8) Read&Review . . . and speculate! **


	7. HOME SWEET HOME KIND OF

**A/N: Okay, so yall's pm messages finally worked. I'm updating again! I can't promise I'll update **_**very**_** frequently, but I will do my best :) Enjoy!**

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**HOME SWEET HOME. KIND OF.**

_"You're on the verge of darkness, firefly,  
>You dance a lonely path among the others,<br>Shattered by the dawn, you dance with the shadows,  
><em>_But the darkness, it smothers."_

_-Meghan Fields; The Firefly_

It was a new thing to have other people staring at my scar again. I'd been either alone or around people who new me so often lately that it was an unforgiving shove back into reality to have people noticing it, and I was getting more than a little uncomfortable there. If I had to guess, I'd say Kaida and Uncle didn't even see it when they looked at me anymore; the mark that painted half my face. To them, it was as much a part of my appearence as my eyes or nose, but these shadowbenders around me; they were all watching me like I was something to steer clear of, rather than a human being, like them or anyone else.

Like the way Sora Aoi's eyes strayed every so often to the side when he glanced back at me.

We weren't so much a group anymore, as we were two pairs of people that happened to be walking in the same direction. While Uncle chose to stay next to me in silence, Kaida and Sora were a few feet in front of us, chattering loudly enough for the entire city to hear. Kaida kept glancing around excitedly, asking Sora about any house, building or landmark that happened to have caught and held her eyes. As it happened, Sora knew plenty of things about the city he lived in, and the two of them didn't shut up the entire walk to our new home.

Something about it all bothered me. Not the fact that Kaida and her new friend weren't shutting up - the girl never really shut up, anyway - but rather the fact that she was not shutting up to someone _other than_ me. I mean, it had taken weeks for the girl to even consider calling me by my actual name, much less have a civilized conversation with me. So, how was it that Sora - this person that Kaida had only just met - could get her to trust him so easily. The whole ordeal didn't sit easily in the pit of my stomach.

As we wove in and out of the maze of pale figures crowding the unblemished streets, my mind kept dragging me back places that I didn't want to go. I could not, for the life of me, figure out whether or not Kaida had lied to me about the other shadowbenders. It was bothering me; not knowing. As much as I tried to convince myself that she wouldn't lie about that kind of thing to me - that she had no logical reason to lie to me - I couldn't fool myself into thinking that she _couldn't _have done it; that she _wouldn't_ have done it.

She could have. She would have. In fact, she was more than capable.

Everyone there seemed to know her, whether Kaida knew them back or not, and her display in front of me now wasn't helping the situation. Sora had called her by her name. Rei had outright observed that she'd 'returned.' Even RB hadn't looked the slightest bit surprised at her showing up on her very doorstep. And now, as we made our way across the city, it wasn't Kaida that they were all staring at in confusion, surprise and distrust. It was Uncle, and it was me.

Needless to say, it was a welcome sight when Sora finally paused in front of an enormous and beautiful house. It was - like all the other houses in the city - made entirely of white stone and empty space. The structure of it was almost geometric, with straight walls and a leveled-off roof. The simplicity of the building was almost calming in the way it reminded me of how our old house on Ember Island was set up.

For the first time the entire trip there, Kaida and Sora managed to stop talking to each other. While Sora busied himself with searching through the heavy ring of keys that Rei had kindly flung at him on his way back to the square, Kaida stepped back in between Uncle and I, practically beaming.

"This is crazy," she told me simply.

"Yeah," I trailed off unconvincingly. It wasn't just crazy. It was one-hundred-percent insane. I had caught myself several times hoping I might wake up any moment and be back on the ship trying to figure out what to do with myself. Of course, it never happened, and, in the end, Sora finally managed to figure out which key unlocked our door. He quickly slid it off the key ring and handed it off to Uncle, as if afraid he might loose it himself.

"Well," Sora began reluctantly before we entered the house, gazing briefly at his feet, "I'd better go and let Rei know which house you're staying in."

"Okay," Kaida answered first, while the other shadowbender skipped backward down the entrance stairs, and I caught myself almost wishing he'd trip.

"I'll be in the square if anyone needs me," he called back to us, then jogged back the way we came, waving and greeting people he passed by. I watched in silence with the others until he was long out of sight.

"Interesting young man," Uncle commented in an amused tone before proceeding to unlock the door to our new residency. I only huffed in response, just happy to be rid of the over-enthusiastic shadowbender for the time being.

I don't know why I expected the inside of the house to be any different, but the sight was still shocking, despite seeing it coming a mile away. The inside was even more stunningly plain and empty than the outside. Even being down in there, where the only substance they had to work with was rock, you still forgot exactly what that meant. That was what made it all so unexpected, and though the house was completely dark the entire room still managed to shimmer faintly as the door swung open, and the light from the streets shone past, only cut off by our sillhouettes.

Kaida shot an orb of light into a lamp suspended from the ceiling, and the whole place came vividly to life. The furniture was a strange combination of the white stone and the glowing, turquoise crystals from the cave walls, which - before the room had been lit up - had been emitting their familiar, blue light. Now, unveiled by the dark, they were as clear and plain as the glass that made up everything else.

Other than that, however, the house was almost as boring and simple as the exterior suggested. There were no carpets, no paintings, no plants cluttering up the rooms. In fact, there was nothing past what was absolutely necessary; to the point that it almost felt uninviting. Suddenly - without warning - Kaida took off, bolting around the corner and up the stairs.

"I call the biggest room!"

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

I definitely would have fought for the room I was now rumagging through. Everything in it was clean and simple, and the view of the city out of the front window was the cherry on top. Despite how pleased I was with my room, through, I had no intention of staying inside of it for very long. I wanted to get out and learn the city like the back of my hand, and, besides, I had sixteen years of not being there to make up for. I would need to get started right away if I ever wanted to get that done.

Everything about what was happening felt like a dream. The reality of all I had just learned and experienced hadn't quite set into my consciousness, yet, so every time I thought about it, it felt like I was being shocked all over again. I supposed it would just take a bit of time for me to get used to the City of Light. Everything there felt so detatched from the rest of the world, like the way you couldn't see the sun or the way Zuko and Iroh were the only people walking around without white hair; and Iroh's hair was technically silver, so he almost blended in as well.

I frowned. Now that I thought about it, Zuko hadn't said hardly a word to me since Sora had found us back outside the city wall. I knew that he didn't like to talk a whole lot, anyway, but he had looked almost irritated when I'd been stealing glances back at him earlier. I supposed that he had to have been uncomfortable around so many shadowbenders, though. Heck, he could hardly stand being around normal people he didn't know. Suddenly, there was a dull rap on the door, followed by Zuko's quiet voice.

"Kaida?"

"Yeah?" I called back, falling onto the surprisingly comfortable bed as he came inside, holding a wad of ivory cloth in one hand. He seemed to be considerably more relaxed than he had been before; something I didn't quite understand but was still glad of.

"I don't think we're in the right rooms," he informed me bluntly, guaging my reaction. I laughed, sitting up lightly.

"No way, Zuko. I called it," I grinned, crossing my arms and basking in the glory of my room. "If you wanted a nicer view, you should have run up the stairs like an idiot before I got the idea."

"No, I'm serious," he persisted, letting the white material in his hand unfold into a silver kimono that very obviously belonged on a girl. "These are all in my closet, and I don't think they're for me."

"You sure, Zuko?" I sputtered, struggling to press my lips together firmly enough that I wouldn't laugh. "You could probably squeeze into it if you really wanted to." I waited for the irritated huff or angry reply or possibly the sound of my door slamming and someone stomping loudly down the hallway, but to my shock he just tossed the kimono to me, his mouth curved up ever so slightly.

"Ha, ha. Very funny," the prince answered calmly, and I was suddenly wary of his lack of a retort. "Just keep it. I wasn't planning on wearing anything from here, anyway." I gazed at him curiously. Something inside me wondered idly why he wasn't as angry as I'd expected him to be, but that wasn't to say I didn't like it, either. I watched Zuko as he turned to leave, but veered in the direction of the stairs, rather than his room. I quirked an eyebrow, automatically sliding onto my feet again. _Going somewhere, are we?_

I followed the prince downstairs wordlessly, fingering the silver rail stuck to the wall. I wasn't being particularly quiet, and he probably knew I was behind him either way, but I didn't say anything; just followed. I noticed quickly that Iroh had already disappeared from the house, as well. I hadn't the foggiest idea where he would have gone off to, but the living room was bleak and empty without the man. Zuko stopped - so I paused, too - turning back around to stare at me for a minute with a partially bewildered expression, before continuing in the direction of the door. The minute he began moving, I followed again, still not speaking. Finally, halfway down the front steps, Zuko's patience ran out.

"Is there a reason you're following me?"

"Where are you going?" I quizzed, ignoring his question and substituting my own. For a second, the prince looked like he didn't know what to say to that, but recovered quickly enough as I bounced down the stairs next to him.

"Nowhere," he answered dubiously, as if it were obvious. "I'm just going to walk around."

"Hmm . . . okay," I decided, striding down the stairs once again. I would have kept going if I hadn't noticed that Zuko was no longer beside me. In fact, when I looked back at him, his feet were still glued securely to the steps, and he continued to stare doubtfully at me, as if waiting for an answer.

"What?" I demanded, returning the prince's look of bewilderment. "Did you expect me to sit up in my room and let you mope around by yourself?" I crossed my arms expectantly, putting on a bored face for show. Slowly, and with with an almost insultingly suspicious expression, Zuko closed the distance between us. We began to walk in no particular direction, the silence surprisingly easy; until Zuko broke it, that is.

"Not that I'm complaining," the prince murmured, refusing to meet my eyes as we strode through the traffic of people on the pavement, "But since when do you want to go anywhere with me? You didn't exactly enjoy restocking in port towns."

I bit my lip in thought. Darn it, he had me there. It wasn't particularly something I had planned on contemplating. If I was being perfectly honest with myself, I might even say that I _wanted _to spend time with him, or some crazy nonsense like that; a thought that almost gave me a mini heart attack. If I wanted to be in denial and lie to myself, though, then the answer was that there was no one else around to walk with, so I'd just chosen him. For the time being, I would settle with voluntary denial.

"It's annoying when you get all depressed and disappear for five days," I shrugged, as if that covered it, locking my fingers behind my head. It didn't of course, but he didn't need to know that. "And you're absolutely right. I hated going with you and Iroh into town. All I did was sleep on benches and get kicked out of places." I glared up at the cave ceiling. Stupid theft laws. I was only borrowing it . . .

"You know, you're the one who asked to come with us," Zuko pointed out. "And it's never been f - hey, wait a minute! I don't get depressed." The prince was suddenly scowling in my direction. I planted my hands on my hips, already poised to shoot back.

"Says the guy who never laughs at anything," I replied, grinning with satisfaction. Zuko's lip quirked up at my comment, and I would almost have thought that he was enjoying the argument.

"Guess you're just not as funny as you think you are, huh?" The prince's eyes were suddenly blazing; on fire in a way I'd never seen. We had gotten in arguments before, but I was usually the only one who enjoyed them. Now, Zuko was smirking right back at me, and it was . . . wierd.

"Hey, at least I'm funnier than you are," I pointed out, earning a dubious look from the prince.

"That isn't exactly saying much," he reminded me shortly.

"Whatever, Zuko," I huffed, sticking my nose in the air. "I'm a freaking joy to be around."

"Yeah, you're a ray of sunshine."

Suddenly, we both stopped short, staring at each other. I blinked. Zuko blinked. We didn't move for a moment, still frozen and very much in each other's faces. Then, the next thing I knew, we were nearly doubled over laughing. I just couldn't help it. It was such a stupid thing to be fighting about, but that detail only made it more entertaining to me. Honestly, out of all the things we could have argued over.

That certainly hadn't happened in a while. The last time we'd gotten in a fight had been well over a week ago; probably a new record for us. It actually felt nice to be disagreeing again. We both seemed to recognize that we suddenly weren't angry with each other anymore at the exact same time, because we backed off simultaneously. Zuko looked away, and I scratched my head, neither of us speaking a word.

"Hey," Zuko said finally, shattering the short, silent moment between us. "Where . . . are we?" I pulled myself out of my own mind, taking a look around. In the midst of our, er, conversation, I hadn't been paying a whole lot of attention to where we had been going, so it was an unexpected sight to suddenly find myself surrounded by the most beautiful garden I had ever seen.

It was like a half-and-half courtyard. While some of the flowers and plants growing there were normal - just like the ones you would find anywhere else on earth - it was the other ones that made me do a double take. Embedded deeply into the midnight-colored ground and scatterd evenly about the garden were tens - even hundreds - of little, crystal flowers that caught the light from the lamps around them and shone brightly in the small koi pond at the very center.

"Whoa," I breathed, deflating slightly as I did so. I turned to Zuko, about to ask him what exactly he would do if I decided to push him into the pond by accident, but his expression stopped me from saying anything. He seemed almost . . . out of focus, the way he was looking at me. It was like he didn't even see the garden, or like he was really, really tired. Only, he wasn't tired, he was just . . . staring at me.

My heart spasmed a little as I leaned back, my eyebrows shooting up. I suddenly didn't know what to say; didn't know what to do. So, I did the first thing that popped into my head at that very second. I coughed loudly - like I was choking on something kind of loud. He raised an eyebrow; the gesture demanding an explanation. I laughed nervously.

"You were spaced out," I tried lamely, attempting to change the subject. Zuko opened his mouth like he was going to say something, but whatever he was about to tell me was interrupted by a cold voice.

"You two wouldn't be lost, would you?"

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**A/N: Oooo, who is it? And you all should be happy, because I'm trying to heat things up between Kaida and Zuko ;) Read and Review! I'll have more out soon.**


	8. WE MEET ZUKO'S FEMALE CLONE

**A/N: Well, heeeeeyyyyyy there . . . yeah, I have nothing to say for myself. Is anyone still out there? This story has metaphorical cobwebs **_**all**_** over it, but I'm hoping to motivate myself this summer and actually do stuff, like finish it or something . . . soooo, yeah. That's where my mind is right now. Please? Please come back? X)**

**Disclaimer: I disclaim myself from ATLA!**

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**WE MEET ZUKO'S FEMALE CLONE**

_"Firefly, sweet firefly.  
>The fire inside that makes you feel alive<br>Is on the verge of your consumption."  
>-Meghan Fields, "The Firefly"<em>

"You wouldn't be lost, would you?"

Zuko and I both jumped a little, though neither of us would admit to actually being caught off guard, our heads snapping in the direction of the stoic, controlled voice. Where I had expected an adult woman to be, however, stood a thin girl just a little taller than myself. She watched me with the face of someone who knew she was higher class. A single, silver braid cascaded down her back, reaching almost to her hips, and her pale blue eyes were like steel. The very way she held herself spoke only of grace, and - from the looks of her formal clothing - she was some kind of noble.

A dull-but-distrustful expression painted the girl's features, which I was quickly learning to return with ease, and she gazed at us expectantly. One hand was held up by her side, the point of light from her fingertip casting shadows across her pale face. Zuko and I exchanged a quick glance.

"No," I lied easily. "We're not lost." The girl's light eyebrows slowly drifted up, disbelief making her expression somehow colder.

"You're sure you're not lost?" she repeated, although she was beginning to lose the convincing tone of voice.

"Yeah, I'm sure," I assured the shadowbender, though not quite assured, myself. Surely we hadn't gotten that far from the house. "What makes you think we are?" The girl cocked an eyebrow at me.

"You're in my back yard."

I blinked at Zuko in alarm, wondering if it would do us any good to try and make a run for it. I I seriously doubted that the girl in front of me could do anything, but she was very obviously from a highly regarded family. Despite all the changes in mentality I had gone through between Zuko and Iroh, I still had difficulty bringing myself to trust anyone of high stature. People with power tended to abuse it, and having bodyguards was not uncommon by any means.

I suddenly found that Zuko's fingers were around my wrist; tight enough to keep me where I was, but not painful. For only half a second, though it seemed like longer, some part of my mind was lost in the fact that Zuko was holding my hand. At the time, I liked to think that he had somehow guessed at my escape plan and was holding me in place, but that wasn't the whole story, and I knew it. Denial was a defense mechanism, but he was still holding my hand. I caught his eyes inquisitively, but they were unusually unreadable. Instead of adressing me, he looked at the girl front of us.

"Sorry," Zuko answered dutifully, nodding slightly. "We're not from here."

"I know," she replied, cringing a bit. Suddenly, I realized what she meant. I hadn't noticed at first, but now her face was ringing a familiarity bell in my head. She had been the bored-looking girl sitting near the elders' meeting all by herself when we had first arrived. I hadn't recognized her at first because, well, I had hardly noticed her to begin with.

"You were in the square," I voiced. "When we got here, right?" The girl nodded, her long braid swaying.

"Yes," she answered, her voice unwavering, yet soft. "I'm Xoe Kumaru-"

"Xoe!"

The ivory-skinned girl breathed in, her magnified eyes pulled back in the direction she'd come from. Something about the voice that had called her name seemed to have distressed her. Her expression was suddenly caught somewhere between worry and irritation, but it only lasted for a short moment. After only seconds, she remembered us standing there next to her, and her sapphire eyes iced over again as she turned back in our direction.

"You two should leave."

It was all she said to us before letting out another irritated huff and dashing off toward the voice that had called her. Her single braid momentarily came almost close enough to whip my nose before she was gone. Zuko and I stared belatedly after the strange girl, or rather the place she had disappeared into, trying to work out what exactly had just happened.

Something about it was bothering me. Xoe's defineably panicked expression was odd enough, but that voice . . . It couldn't have been familiar to me, because I knew consciously that I had never heard it before, but my subconscious was violently disagreeing with me. I tried to remember the sound of it, just to be sure, but it was no use. I hadn't been paying enough attention for it to have been recallable. It was Zuko who finally snapped me from my speculations before I could decide to do something ridiculous.

"Let's go," he suggested, only just letting go of my hand. "We probably shouldn't be here."

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

My foot finally made contact with the small stone I'd been inconspicuously trying to reach for the past few minutes. The rock flew across the barely populated street, hitting the base of a jewelery stand. The owner of the vendor looked over aimlessly, trying to discern where the sound had come from, but didn't pay any particular attention to me as he did. Next to me, Kaida sat, quietly fidgeting with some odd-looking thing she'd bought from a shop we had passed by on our walk back into the square. To be honest, I didn't think she had the slightest idea what it was, but she seemed bent on figuring out what it was supposed to do, so I didn't bother her.

Earlier, she'd been bugging me to walk into a few places with her, just to look around, but I'd told her that I didn't feel like it. At first, Kaida had acted like she didn't care, leaving me outside and walking through the randomly placed stores by herself. After about ten minutes, however, she'd come back outside with me, mumbling something about not wanting to shop anymore. Now we were side by side on the edge of an old, empty fountain, doing pretty much nothing.

I could tell by her face that she was trying to figure something out; her lower lip would stick out just a bit, and her eyes would narrow fractionally. I, of course, had a few more things to think about than usual, but if I was being perfectly honest with myself I felt better when I wasn't thinking too much into things. I tended to over-analyze, anyway. Still, I couldn't help but wonder what Kaida was thinking so intently about. She looked comical - like she was giving herself a headache. As if she had heard my thoughts, the shadowbender sighed in defeat, her posture straightening out again.

"What are we going to do, Zuko?"

I was sure that a dull expression must have appeared on my face when she said that. She could at least have put a bit more effort into the question; especially if her goal was to get a decent, useful answer out of me.

"What do you mean?" The shadowbender's lips tightened, as if a part of her didn't want me to understand what she was asking.

"I mean, what are we going to do about," she paused, her emerald eyes attempting to speak the rest of the sentence for her. "About the avatar." I was taken aback for a moment. That was not what I had been expecting her to ask. It was a topic we'd only discussed once or twice before, but I somehow had the feeling that I knew what she was implying.

If there was one thing that I did not have a definite answer for, it was that. Hunting down the elusive avatar had been the very definition of my life and purpose before, but there was something picking at the back of my mind; something that I'd not only beat down a long time ago, but that I had all but banished from my being. It was that tiny thought that now surfaced at Kaida's seemingly-innocent question.

Was I going to find and capture the avatar, or was I going to join him?

Turmoil rang inside my mind just thinking about it. It didn't make sense to be indecisive. Helping the avatar - and, worse, betraying my own people - contradicted my entire existance since the day I left home. My initial thought was that I would rather die than turn my back on my whole nation, on my family; my father. It would have felt so natural to scowl at Kaida and ask her what she thought I was going to do. It didn't happen, though. I knew what was stopping me from immediately siding with the fire nation, and it bothered me more than anything else about the issue.

Kaida would never help me capture the avatar. If I was sure of anything, I was sure about that. She already had a reason to detest the fire nation, and even if she didn't I still knew her well enough to be able to guess at that. There was no way she would side with the people who killed her mother and took her family away. It didn't matter how close we had gotten lately, she was still obnoxiously independent-minded. She wouldn't simply stand by and watch if I chose to continue raiding towns in search of someone who may or may not even exist. She would try and stop me.

"I . . . don't know, yet," I answered dubiously.

I was too conflicted at the time to think very much into it. I wasn't the same person I was when I left the fire nation. There had been so many things that I hadn't expected to happen when I left. To be perfectly honest, I had thought that finding the avatar would be quick and simple. I'd had the drive, after all. But then things had started to get complicated. I'd traveled the nations, learning things I had never been taught back in the palace. I'd been forced to work with people I wouldn't have had to before, and I'd gotten to know them along the way.

They said that history was written by the winners; not the losers. No fire nation school had ever mentioned that the water tribes and the earth kingdom were just as important to the world as the fire nation seemed to think that _it _was. Kaida leaned forward to gaze at her feet before turning her jade eyes on me again.

"You do realize we'll have to do _something_," she prompted, her eyebrow sliding up. "Preferably _before_ your dad decides he wants to end the world." Her eyes were expectant, but not in an accusing way. She seemed to think her question was innocent enough, but I couldn't help but resent the way she spoke of my father's plans so casually; as if they were nothing more than an annoyance.

"I know that," I replied shortly, deflated. "Anyway, I was under the impression that you'd want to stay here for a while." Kaida bit her lip, suddenly looking eager and unsure at the same time as she pulled one knee up to her chest.

"Well, I was kind of hoping to get a . . ." the shadowbender trailed off, looking almost embarrassed with herself. "A master." Her eyes were on her feet, again, but I hardly noticed. Of course she'd want a shadowbending master to teach her. I had almost forgotten that she'd never had any real training. It was a simple, unknowing comment, coming from her, but something about it made my stomach tighten.

Sora. There was no real foundation behind my suspicions, but somehow I knew that if Kaida would ask anyone, it would be him. It only made sense, of course. Sora was the first shadowbender she had met, and - as much as I didn't want to admit it - he was also the most friendly. I really shouldn't have cared who taught her, but - then again - I did a lot of things that I shouldn't have. And the worst part of it all was that I knew if it would be anyone else teaching Kaida, I _wouldn't_ care.

"Hey," Kaida nudged me in the arm. "What's wrong?" Coming from anybody else, the words would have sounded soft and concerned, but she somehow managed to make them sound like she was being bothered. I was grateful for that, though. I knew - and she must have known as well - that I didn't like to be comforted or have people worry about me.

"I - It's nothing," I sighed, feeling my temperature escalate. "I-"

"Zuko!"

Across the square, Uncle had appeared out of nowhere and was waving me forward; trying to get me to go over where he was. I pursed my lips, fingers tightening on the obsidian stone of the fountain as he continued to beckon me over. I subconsciously hoped that the man might give up and come back later, but he only stood there expectantly, calling something about needing me for something. Something insignificant in the long run because it was stealing me away from this moment. I huffed, pushing myself up; Kaida doing the same.

"Where the heck has he been?" the shadowbender quizzed, stretching her arms above her head.

"I'm not sure," I answered unwilingly. "I should probably go see what he wants, though."

"Kay," she replied easily, turning halfway. "You go ahead. I need to go interrogate somebody." The glint in Kaida's eyes was unmistakable as she uttered that last sentance. "I'll see ya later."

**A/N: I have no excuses! And I don't like to set deadlines, as I have a habit of breaking them, but expect a new chapter out soon! Read&Review!**

**B 3**


	9. WHERE THE SUN DON'T SHINE

**A/N: I don't know what to say other than that I have the best readers in the world 3 Thank you all for continuing to read and review this story!  
>The Replicator - Thank you so much for your thoughts! That is actually an aspect of shadowbending that I've struggled with, but I will try to develop a distinct style of movement for the shadowbenders!<br>animelover56348 - I actually don't know if I should be flattered or concerned for my safety X) So, thank you, kind of, maybe.  
>Ninjagirl2211 - All in good time, dear ;) You're on the right track with your assumptions, though.<strong>

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**WHERE THE SUN DON'T SHINE**

_"Firefly, sweet firefly,_

_The fire inside that lets you know you're alive_

_Is a misunderstood presumption."_

_-Meghan Fields, "The Firefly"_

I strode across the lamp-lit streets of the City of Light, freely trailing a ribbon of luminescence around my thin frame with my left hand. For once, nobody stopped to gawk at me. A few people even grinned in my direction, bending their own apparitions in a friendly response. It gave me a sense of kinship, of belonging: something I had never really had, even with my own dysfunctional family. Being the "odd one out" in our little household of granny and Leila had left me feeling like an outcast, at best, despite their efforts to treat me as if I were even some semblance of normal. But here, in this wonderful, fantastic place that seemed so much like a vivid dream, I had never felt so normal. It was a strange and new feeling to me, but I loved it all the same. I loved not feeling like the freak show for once. It was nice.

The narrow, gray road I was wandering down slowly let out into the elder's meeting square, a suprisingly open space when it wasn't packed with cranky, hundred-year-old men. I skipped forward contentedly into the peaceful city-center. It seemed that Rei and the others had long since finished their discussion because people were now strolling randomly through the open courtyard, the earlier scene just a phantom of a memory. The light from the shadowbending lamps made it seem almost something like daytime back in the back in the real world, where things still made sense, but it was still very easy to tell that the shadow-made sunlight wasn't the real thing. Shadowbending, although a natural ability it seemed, had a kind of unnatural hue to it. I supposed that it was similar to the way water would move in an unnatural motion in a waterbender's hands, or how rock would become unusually versitile to an earthbender. Natural at its roots, but spiritually and inexplicably enhanced at the same time.

It definitely explained why all the shadowbenders in the City of Light were so pale. Even though they had their lamps and their bending, it just wasn't the natural sunlight that I was already beginning to miss desperately. The idea had actually been shocking when I'd first thought about it. In theory, Zuko, Iroh and I were the only people down there who had ever even _seen_ the sun, or the sky, for that matter. None of the natives knew what clouds were; what birds were. They were down here - wherever _here_ was - living in the dark off of what little they could grow with the limited light source they had. I had recently tried the 'home-grown' food they had to offer, and it had without-a-doubt made the list of top five worst things I'd ever put into my mouth; right up there with Zuko's tea.

It had made me feel wierd temporarily; like I was some sort of outsider. Nobody was treating me like I didn't belong - if anything, Sora had made me feel like I'd been living there all my life - but it didn't change the fact that I knew more than the others. Or, more specifically, I knew more about the outside world than the rest of them. Even when Sora and I had been talking with each other, I'd had to explain my word choice a couple of times where I normally wouldn't have had to; and on things that anyone outside the City of Light would have clearly understood. Surprisingly enough, it was RB, the twelve-year-old scientifically-inclined niece of Rei Bouta, who seemed to know the most about the world above.

Speaking of young RB and her uncle, Rei . . . there was something very odd about them, now that I thought about it. About everyone, in fact, but those two seemed to act the strangest around me. I knew that I was still the new girl around, but they all seemed so . . . verbally hesitant. It was so subtle that I hardly even picked up on the difference in demeanor, but it just seemed as though everyone in the city was watching their words around me; as if they were trying to keep something a secret. I shook it off, briefly. I was likely just seeing things that weren't even there. The other shadowbenders were surely just taking their time getting used to me and getting to know these outsiders who had imposed themselves on their home. Still, though . . .

My eyes ran over the sparsely populated square, landing automatically on the familiar faces of Sora Aoi and Xoe Kumaru - the girl from the garden earlier. They were sitting comfortably on the marbled steps of a large, ivory building, talking with each other. It was like a scene out of a storybook, the two of them. Sora appeared to be telling some kind of exciting story, because he was making dramatic hand gestures and seemed almost unable to remain seated next to the somber girl. Xoe smiled in a quiet kind of way, leaning unconsciously toward Sora, cheek resting gingerly on her dainty, white hand, and her attitude completely different from what it had been when Zuko and I had met her just a little while ago. Now, her features were relaxed and unguarded - contented, even - as she fiddled with the end of her ivory braid and listened keenly to whatever it was Sora was animatedly telling her.

Sora seemed far too into his intreguing tale for me to be glad about interrupting whatever he was talking about - the two had this kind of intangible, fairytale-like bubble encircling them that I almost couldn't bring myself to pop - but I had some important questions I needed to ask him; needed to ask Sora, in particular. I had already started to trust him - more than I had ever considered only that morning, when we officially met. I could hardly believe that I hadn't even known Sora's name just hours earlier, but that didn't mean he was going to get out of owning up for a few things.

I walked with a purpose toward the pair, my snowy hair swishing around my shoulders irritatingly. Some lesser part of my mind amended to get my brand new knife out later and hack a few inches off before the length got too maddening. When I was just a few steps away from him, Sora finally broke from his story and glanced up, a grin lighting up his face. Xoe did the same, but rather than grinning she adopted a kind of guarded look, as if I had broken some vitally important moment between them and had come to sweep her storyteller away. I couldn't honestly understand the girl's expression, but Sora jumped up and greeted me before I even had time to contemplate the reasons behind it.

"Hey!" he exclaimed brightly, rocking back on his heels. "Came to visit me?" I let myself smile vaguely at his words, but I still had to remember my reason for being there.

"Sort of," I replied, smirking. Something about Sora just made me want to smirk. "I have a few things I wanted to ask you about, actually." He didn't seem to suspect exactly _what _I was going to ask him, though, because he continued to grin carelessly. Beside him, Xoe fidgeted, stood and then took a step back. What small whisper of a smile she'd had on her face before was gone, now, as she began to glide in the direction of her house. Sora turned like he was going to ask her to stay, but she stopped him before he could try it, shaking her head.

"I have to go check up on something right now," she gave as an excuse, her tone so set that even I wouldn't have had the nerve to try and argue with her. Without another word or even a stony glance, Xoe strode gracefully around the street curve and out of sight. Sora stared after the girl for a belated moment, but then turned back to me, his face alighting once again.

"So, what were you going to ask me?" he inquired, unknowingly.

I bit my lip quickly, wondering how to ask him tactfully. I had planned on being very straight-forward and blunt with the shadowbender, but it was a surprisingly difficult thing to keep the frown and the glare on my face when I was near Sora. And I didn't _want_ to be mad at him; I really didn't. Before I had officially met him, it had been easy to harbor the suspicions and remain wary of the peppy shadowbender, but now that I knew him I just couldn't be. Everything he said was so sincere and trustworthy. I couldn't stop myself from already beginning to think of him as a friend.

"The first time we met," I started, and Sora's ever-present grin slipped the slightest bit, like he knew what was coming next and perhaps wished that it wasn't. "I need to know what you did to me." The flashback replayed itself in my mind; falling into the darkness, following the strange, glowing path, seeing the mysterious, white shadowbender for the first time. Sora sighed as if to prolong the explanation, gazing at my apologetically. I waited for him to speak.

"Like I told you all earlier, I'm one of the benders who guards the entrances to the shadow world," he began, sitting back down on the marbled staircase and motioning me to do the same. I followed, waiting for Sora to continue. "Well, I was at the outer gate, that day."

"Outer gate?" I repeated in confusion. He nodded.

"There are a few entrances into the shadow world," Sora explained, his relaxed smile beginning to return, much to my relief. "The one you sort of . . . fell into . . . was the closest to the outside world. Depending on the amount of shadowbending used to transport yourself here, you can end up at different gates." He smiled appreciatively. "That's why no one stopped you this last time. It's because you used enough of your bending power to skip right by them all." I nodded, but didn't speak, still trying to process what he was saying. It was already beginning to be more of an explanation than I had been bargaining for, but I prompted him to continue.

"So, you were at the first gate?" I confirmed.

"Uh, huh," Sora nodded. "Ever since RB made it easy for us to get in and out of the City of Light, we've had a few nonbenders slip through to the first gate by accident, you know, every now and then - usually people more in tune with the spirit world than others."

"So," I paused, "You thought I wasn't a shadowbender?" He cocked his head to the side, thinking about how to answer.

"Well, at first I didn't think so," he amended. "I put up a light barrier keep you from going any further, but then you said something funny . . . like you recognized that I was a shadowbender." I suddenly remembered what he was talking about. Mostly I had just been speaking my thoughts out of shock. I hadn't even noticed that I'd done it until just then.

"That light barrier," I pointed out, my memory of being stunned immoble pulling a frown onto my face. Sora laughed nervously.

"Er, yeah. Sorry about that, Kaida," the peppy shadowbender rushed, running his hand through his hair distractedly as he apologized. "I sort of panicked. I didn't really know what to do with you, so I kinda forced you back to the outside world a little too quickly." My smirk quirked up at the way the pitch of his voice got higher toward the end of his sentence.

"Not that I'm blaming you, Sora," I began, fully intent on embarassing him, "But Zuko and Iroh both thought I'd completely lost my mind after you did that."

"Eheheh," the shadowbender blushed, his shoulders going up. "Whoops?"

I laughed aloud at Sora's genuinely innocent expression. He was possibly the most adorable thing I'd ever seen. I couldn't believe I had expected anything less than that. And here I had been worried that Sora was going to reveal some horrible, sinister motive. I should have guessed, though, that his conscience was as white as his silvery hair. I almost felt silly for even feeling the need to ask him about it.

"It's fine," I assured him with a flick of my wrist. "They think I'm insane either way." In response, Sora's sheepish expression quickly melted into a warm grin. As I smiled back at the pallid shadowbender, a new idea suddenly occurred to me.

"So," I began slowly, my voice fluctuating, hinting at my next words. "Rei told me that you're the youngest bender to ever be named a watcher . . ." My sentence traied off endlessly as I looked to Sora for some kind of confirmation. He didn't disappoint.

"Yep," the shadowbender beamed, obviously ecstatic to have been recognized and called out on his record. I smiled, utilizing flattery to its fullest.

"You must be a pretty great bender, then," I continued, heavily insinuating my motives, now. Sora shrugged, clearly not used to getting compliments from people, his cheeks stained with the lightest peach undertones.

"Well," he evaded, dragging out the word sheepishly. "You know . . ."

"Probably even good enough to teach others of your masterful ways," I prompted, my eyebrows rising theatrically as I willingly pressured the innocent boy into my metaphorical corner. Sora's expression soon mimicked mine and he nodded his head vigorously at the idea. I smiled triumphantly.

"Oh, definitely," he replied, his wispy hair bouncing up and down as he continued to nod unconsciously. I let out a dramatic, despairing sigh.

"If only I had someone as great as you to mentor me in the ways of shadowbending," I cried in a theatrical manner, proving once and for all that acting really was _not_ my calling. Regardless of how badly my thespian skills stank, though, Sora seemed more than ready to jump at the opportunity presented.

"I could teach you, Kaida," he offered without missing a beat, his peaceful, blue eyes lighting up joyfully at the very prospect.

"Really?" I checked, my own eyes alight. This time, my sheer contentedness was not all feigned acting. I was truly excited at the thought of getting to train with a shadowbender; a _real _shadowbender, who had been brought up learning things the traditional, proper way. Sora knew shadowbending the way it was intended to be. No doubt Rei had trained him the exact same way my ancestors had been taught for generations; _our_ ancestors.

And suddenly, I had another tether connecting me to this city, these people. I was one of them, though I hadn't even had to try. It just happened so naturally, being a shadowbender, fitting in, connecting with people and past.

It all seemed as though I had stumbled through this mess that I called my life just so that I could find my own destiny in the end, in fate's funny and misguided way.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**A/N: So, as my regulars already know, I typically end a chapter on a good note (such as I just have) as my own special way of saying that sh** is about to hit the fan. Take that how you will, and have a lovely day!**

**Expect a new chapter out soon! Read&Review!**

**B 3**


	10. PRACTICALLY A PROFESSIONAL EAVESDROPPER

**I'M PRACTICALLY A PROFESSIONAL EAVESDROPPER**

_"Pessimism and optimism are slammed up  
>against each other in my records,<br>the tension between them is where it's all at,  
>it's what lights the fire."<br>-Bruce Springsteen_

I rubbed my offending arm, soothing my now-bruised shoulder and equally-as-bruised ego. Not that anyone could blame me for running away, though. That syringe that RB had calmly tried, and succeeded, to stab me with was entirely too large for anyone to just sit down and take like a man. Even Uncle had repeatedly asked the young, colorful girl if there was any other, possibly less traumatic, way to solve our issue. RB had followed up with a flippant, almost enjoyable 'Nope', and that was the end of that conversation. In truth, anyone would have been terrified. That was my excuse and I was sticking with it.

Of course, the trauma I suffered at the hands of the spacey scientist was paled in comparison to the relief I felt as its eventual effects started to sink in. The entire process took no more than one, short hour, and I had never been so relieved at the sight of a weak-but-steady flame springing to life at my command. It seemed like no time at all as our fire bending sluggishly returned to Uncle and I, and, after what felt like an eternity of a day without it, I almost wanted to cry in relief when it was finally back. The only thing stopping that reaction was the meager need to keep what was left of my dignity in tact. Vaguely, I thought about how Kaida would have chuckled at that statement.

Kaida. I shook my head, as if the action would somehow ward off ghost thoughts about the girl, which had plagued me every second I wasn't getting chased down and tackled by RB over the past hour. It didn't help. I internally kicked myself again, my memory dragging me unwillingly back into that garden with her. Before Xoe Kumaru had showed up and practically kicked us out, I'd had the most insane notion; the most ridiculous idea of my life. Even entertaining the thought, now, was . . . I shuddered, goosebumps forming a second flesh over my body. I tried to shake the feeling off, but I simply couldn't get it to leave me alone. It was constantly there, nagging me in the back of me mind, pulling my thoughts where they absolutely did not need to be.

Kaida was my friend, I argued half-heartedly with myself. She was my best friend, and in many ways that entitled her to be one of the most important people to me. Often I would just sit and wonder what on earth I ever would have done without the insane, eccentric shadowbender. The truth was, I really didn't know. That being said, however, she was still _just_ my best friend. I knew it, and she knew it too. It was a simple fact of our lives that we had both just mentally decided to accept. So, why, then, was I sitting there under the not-so-watchful care of RB Bouta, questioning that balance?

"Alright, you two," RB began, her nasal voice breaking through the chaotic turmoil of my thoughts. I watched as the perpetually-frazzled shadowbender sniffed, pushing her glasses higher up on the bridge of her nose. "Your firebending should be completely restored, now." She looked at her personal clip board as she spoke to Uncle and I. "I'll see you again in fourteen days for your bi-weekly treatment." With that final sentence, the deceptively-young girl looked up with a diabolical glint in her eyes.

Fortunately, Uncle went ahead and thanked the little sadist for all of her _help_, because I couldn't quite find it in myself to be grateful toward her just yet. RB seemed to realize this, smirking in my direction specifically before turning on her heel and heading off toward who-knows-where.

I stood up, my knees almost shaking with the lack of energy the restoration of my bending had left me with. I pushed the fatigue aside stepped forward, my limbs falling easily into the unmistakable stance of a firebender. My hands smoothly drew the origins of a young, but promising glow, and I watched as the light flared and suddenly began to dance with a life of its own . . .

A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N

. . . I watched as the light flared and suddenly began to dance with a life of its own.

To say that Sora was great had been a tremendous understatement. Maybe I had been foolishly put off by his ridiculously carefree personality or perhaps the fact that he was clumsy and not to mention slightly goofy most of the time, but the talent the kid had hidden behind that radiant attitude was nothing if not astonishing. I thought I had mastered control of light and dark years ago, but it was clear, standing there insignificantly in front of Sora, that I hardly understood anything yet.

'Yet,' being the key word.

The shadowbender glided effortlessly around on the spot, catching my eye with that glint of wonder mixed with amusement at my obviously dumbstruck expression. His light was like water and fire all at once, moving with the alteration and mobility of both, yet posessing both the maneuverability of a liquid and the speed of a flame. And something else; something barely contained within his slight frame.

With a final flourish, Sora wrapped the band of light around itself and let it slowly dissolve into the transparency of the glow of the city. Though the incandescence was gone, the cave-like sheen of the clearing was soon illuminated by the radiance of the shadowbender's smile. I felt the urge to clap or something, but restrained myself.

"Spirits," I whispered, the airiness in my voice left over from the astonishment of the whole spectacle. My playful attitude quickly picked back up, however. "You were being modest." Sora laughed; an honest, welcome sound.

"I'm really not that great," he chuckled, still being overly modest in my opinion. "You should see Xoe." Something in his eyes lit up as he spoke her name. "She's the real prodigy. She kicks my butt in training." I frowned.

"Well, in that case, I really don't want to know what she'd do to me," I half-mumbled, thinking back on the taller, more intimidating girl. "She already doesn't seem to like me all that much." This seemed to catch Sora off guard. He tilted his head to the side, his eyes begging questions that his mouth was holding captive. I smirked, hoping to simply brush off the unpleasant subject entirely. Unfortunately, Sora didn't seem to be on the same page as I was.

"I'm sure she likes you," he began, though sounding an awful lot like he was trying to convince himself of that truth. "She's really a nice person. She just comes off a little harsh sometimes. She really doesn't mean it, I'm sure." Sora's voice sounded genuine, but his eyes were troubled, as if he had wondered, himself, about the very thing I was questioning. I narrowed my eyes. I knew I had not been imagining things.

"I believe you," I answered, half-truthfully. I believed that he believed what he was saying. "Anyway, if I'm ever going to have a prayer of being as talented as you, I'll need a whole lot of practice." I offered up a ribbon of light, once again very aware of my hopeless mediocrity in the presence of a _real_, trained bender. Easily distracted, Sora returned my taunting smile and copied the move with twice the grace and half the trouble I'd had attempting it.

"Alright, first thing's first, my pupil," he began theatrically. "Your stance needs some work."

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

I had never particularly liked books. In all honesty, what was the point of a book? Some of them told of fiction, of things that had never happened and never could happen. Impossibilities. The rest told them of history; needless, speaking only of past failures and the endless mishaps of humanity. I had never liked books, because the happiness was made up and the hardships were real.

I felt out of place in the library of the City of Light. Honestly, I felt completely out of place everywhere I went in the city, but the library in particular. I had no clue what I was doing there, but I suspected it had something to do with my aversion to going back to an empty house and my need to always feel like I was doing something, _anything._ I had this problem with feeling useless. Uncle was meeting with Rei Bouta and his niece about transportation between the outside and the shadow world, Kaida was out doing . . . well, whatever she did these days . . . and I apparently felt compelled to occupy myself to prove that I didn't need them either; a sentiment that would ultimately prove a failure in the end.

My eyes panned past the book covers, looking, but not really seeing anything. Nothing particularly stood out to me; or, more accurately, nothing looked like it could distract me from the turmoil running rampant in my mind.

". . . he'll never buy that, and you know it . . ."

The muted voice floated past my ears, awakening my previously dormant curiosity about the literature-filled dungeon I had confined himself to. It was a soft, yet commanding voice. And it was one that I recognized in a heartbeat.

"You should go back . . ." the same steady voice continued dubiously. I moved half-consciously toward the muted conversation, taking refuge behind the barricade of book cases filling the large room. I had assumed the library to be essentially vacant, but apparently that wasn't entirely the case.

"I can't do that," a different voice started. This one was deeper and somehow soothing; calm. "Especially now that I know the situation. I can't just leave again." At that last sentence, the deeper voice broke, a gale of emotion knocking his words around.

"I know you feel that way, but now may not be the best time-"

"Of course not, kid, but will there really ever be a 'good' time for this to happen?" the male voice interjected gently. "You know how long it's been ." For a long moment, the other voice did not answer. Finally, there was a curt huff.

"Honestly, probably not, but doing it right now would only make things more confusing," the girl's voice reasoned, now on the edge of pleading. "Everybody just needs to take some time to settle things down." For a few tense minutes, both of the mysterious voices fell silent, and I could only imagine the kind of oppositional looks they might have been shooting each other. I edged closer, ever so slightly, straining to hear the rest of their discussion with no thought of getting caught.

"You'll get your chance, I promise," the girl was the first to break the frozen moment, her tone unexpectedly softer; consoling. "You will." The taut silence stretched on for a short while before the man's voice returned; defeated, now.

"I suppose you're right . . ." He chuckled softly. "You usually are." The traces of a tired smile were present in his tone, now. "I'll be out of the way."

There was the sound of a door closing softly, followed by a tiny, exasperated sigh, and I slowly remembered to breathe again. All of a sudden, I was very aware of my suspicious position, no longer caught up in the moment. Before I could consider slipping away, however, a thin girl suddenly came veering around the book case I was taking refuge behind, rubbing her temple and not paying the slightest attention to where she was going. Before I had the chance to dodge her beeline for the front entrance, she bumped into me, not hard enough to hurt either of us, but certainly enough to startle me and shake her out of her inner conflicts.

Out of habit, I took her shoulder, steadying her. I met Xoe Kumaru's sky-colored eyes, registering the shocked and strangely-vulnerable expression on her face. For one, endless moment, it seemed that she didn't know what to say or do, so the shadowbender simply stared at me, mouth agape.

"I'm sorry," I spoke, my voice low but sincere. "Are you alright?"

That rare show of vulnerability only lasted a moment before the astonishment in Xoe's eyes iced over.

"Fine," she answered coldly, then seemed to realize the harshness in her own voice. "I'm the one who should be sorry. I wasn't paying enough attention to where I was going." The authoritative girl placed her thumb and index finger on the bridge of her nose in what would seem like irritation if it had not been for the strained emotion in her tone.

Her eyes were level with mine - I was strangely unused to not having to look down - and her shoulders pulled back elegantly as only a noble's could. That was the first thing I found that I could relate to with this stoic, frigid girl.

"Don't worry about it," I mumbled. I made to turn away, then, and be out of her hair, but her soft-yet-steely voice caught me before I could make my way out.

"You-" I turned halfway in curiosity. She pursed her lips suddenly, as if conflicted, then blurted the words out. "You wouldn't happen to know where Kaida is right now, would you?" The question was rushed, as if it were something she didn't want to be caught asking. I felt my eyebrows knit up at the strange question. Xoe simply laced her fingers together expectantly, biting her lower lip in a familiar way and gazing at me impatiently.

"No, sorry," I answered shortly. Spirits if I knew. Kaida could be anywhere. The girl could be halfway across the world by now, and I wouldn't have been surprised. "I could go look for her, if you really need to find her . . ."

"No, that's fine," Xoe immediately rejected my offer, hugging her chest. "I'm sure she's around here somewhere . . ." She let that sentence trail off doubtfully. I didn't know what was going through her mind, but I definitely knew where _my _thoughts were headed, and - if the defeated look on Xoe's face was any indicator - we may have had the same idea.

I pushed my feet to carry me to the back exit of the library, but something stopped me before I could make myself leave. I sighed, looking back at the quiet, serious shadowbender, who appeared to be exhaustedly lost in her own head again.

"I'll be sure and let you know if I see her."

The girl's light eyes shot up in astonishment at my words, locking with my own gaze. She stared blankly for just a second before regaining her composure, and nodding gratefully. I wasn't sure, but there seemed to be some physical relief in Xoe's face, now, at my somewhat half-hearted assurance.

"Thank you," Xoe bit her lip, "Zuko."

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**A/N: Haha, well that was rather awkward, wasn't it? And who's this mysterious person that everyone is hiding? Read&review if you want to find out! -A.M.**


	11. KAIDA BREAKS

**A/N: Hey, guys! I thought I'd put out this chapter a little early in light of what I'm about to tell you :/ **

**I hate to say this, because I really do love this story and want to finish it, but I feel like Abstraction just doesn't have the readers it used to. I don't know if I should keep writing this story because of that, but I really would like to hear from you guys first before I make that decision, just to be fair. -A.M.**

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

**KAIDA BREAKS**

_"Anger is a symptom,  
>a way of cloaking and expressing feelings<br>too awful to experience directly:  
>hurt, bitterness, grief and, most of all, fear."<br>-Joan Rivers_

I practically dashed down the stairs the morning after my first shadowbending lesson with Sora, hardly pausing to care whether or not I was making too much noise for being up so early. I was sore all over, and my muscles ached from all the strain they had been put through the previous day, yet I was strangely invigorated at the same time. I felt like a new person as I marched obliviously through the kitchen and living room, headed straight for the front entrance.

"Where are you going this early in the morning?" Zuko inquired, looking up from his book with confusion clear in his eyes. I skidded to a halt at the sound of the prince's voice, already halfway out the door. Funny, I hadn't even noticed him sitting quietly there at the kitchen table, reading some brick-sized novel that I'd never before seen him with.

"I need to find Sora so he can answer a question for me," I replied, as if it were obvious and he should have known already. The prince frowned. He looked like he wanted to say more, but something was keeping him from speaking anything further. Instead of answering, Zuko simply turned back to his novel, though something about his posture seemed less . . . less like himself, now.

I sighed, leaving Zuko without a goodbye. He had been acting really strange, lately; more strange than he already was. I mean, honestly, reading? Zuko hated reading. What on earth was he reading for? I couldn't imagine the book was his, and I was sure that the City of Light's library couldn't have been extensive enough to offer anything that would grab his attention, really. It wasn't just the books, though.

We didn't fight constantly, these days. Now, that, I couldn't complain about. I honestly enjoyed getting along with the young prince when I could. But, when we did fight, it was all different; all wrong. Maybe 'wrong' was too strong a word, but it definitely wasn't the same as it used to be. Instead of the straight annoyance I was used to feeling, there was an odd kind indulgence there as well. I felt a strange sort of satisfaction in being the one person who really knew how to get under the prince's skin. I felt it in my heart, and I could see it in Zuko's eyes as well: we put our own brand of affection into our fights.

On top of that, he'd been more secretive than usual. Zuko was never one to spill his feelings to anyone at any given time, but often I got the impression that he was holding back some hoard of secrets from me. At times, he would seem like he wanted to talk, but then he just . . . wouldn't. It was honestly a bit frustrating, especially for somebody who couldn't stand not knowing things.

I made my way in the direction of Sora's house, knowing he would be awake despite the ridiculous hour. The kid was such an early bird. Normally, I would have scrounged up the decency to actually wait for our lesson that day, but I already had so many things that I needed to ask him and not enough patience to sit and ponder them all until that afternoon. I doubted Sora would mind, though, which was my sorry excuse for simply inviting myself over to his house so early.

I was desperate for information. I doubted seriously that I would have done so well as a shadowbending student if I had actually been born in the City of Light, but over sixteen years of figuring things out on my own had left me with a craving for knowledge that I couldn't keep in check. It was driving me to want to spend every free second I had practicing and perfecting my new concept of shadowbending. No hour of the night was too late, nor any hour of the morning too early, to train, especially when I had no idea how long we were ultimately going to end up staying down there in the city.

As I approached Sora's small, cottage-like house, I found - exactly as expected - that he was already wide awake. The friendly shadowbender was actually standing out in his front yard, along with Rei Bouta and another person, who I couldn't see at the time because they were blocked from my view by the two shadowbenders. I smiled, picking up my pace and waving my arm at the two, eager to start bombarding Sora with all of my ridiculous questions.

"Hey, Sora! I need to ask you something-" My voice trailed off deafeningly as Rei and Sora turned in alarm at the sound of my voice, their expressions painted identically with what could only be described as absolute panic as they revealed the mysterious person they were speaking to: a man.

A man with mahogany-brown hair, pulled back at the nape of his neck, with golden eyes and a sad, weathered expression on his face that could only have been the result of long years of hardship, regret and suffering. A man whose face I'd only caught glimpses of in aged photographs and paintings; old photographs and paintings that I had very deliberately cut up and burned a long time ago. A man who, until that moment, had only made his appearances in my dreams - scratch that, nightmares - and should absolutely _not _have been there, standing in front of my eyes the way he was.

_What . . . ?_

Just like that, I was lost.

All at once, the entire world faded into a blurry smear except for that one point of focus where my eyes seemed to be frozen, and for several moments I couldn't remember how to even breathe. My blood had turned to ice, but my soul had been set on fire. It all snapped into place in that one instant as I stood there by Sora, staring at the face of the man; his frown, his amber eyes, and the way he was staring back at me with a look like I was slowly clawing his heart out . . .

I didn't think about what I was doing. I just acted; thoughtless. I didn't even wait that extra split second to let the others know what this man had coming for him. Quicker than ever before, my dagger slid lethally out of its sheath, twisting silently through my fingers and into the palm of my hand. My teeth ground together as I kicked off the spot in a blinded rage. There was only bloodlust pulsing through my mind; nothing else. No sense. No reason. _No_ mercy. Only pure, unbridled killing intent. I meant to kill him. No, I was _going_ to kill him. I would do it right there in the middle of the street for the entire city to watch.

I could see it, right there in his firelight eyes. He _knew_ what I wanted to do; what I was just _dying_ to do. Before the others had even recognized what my intentions were, he already knew. Maybe he had known all along. That was just fine. I didn't care. In fact, I _hoped _that he knew. I hoped that he had been dreading this very moment since the day he ran away like the coward he was and let my mother die-

"Kaida!"

"Kaida, stop!"

The two voices were almost simultaneous; one belonging to Sora, and the other to Rei. Before I had the time to decide to ignore them, I was thrown out of my twisted daydream and back into the City of Light. Sora had his arm like a snare around my waist, holding me back with more force than I would have ever expected out of the scrawny shadowbender. I doubled over, trying to wrestle him off, while Rei took the opportunity to pin my arms down. I struggled even more, not missing the movement of Rei's fingers toward my hand, intent on prying the dagger away from me. I held on to it, shoving against the older man with enough strength to cause him to fly a few feet back.

"Let go of me, Sora," I screamed, the bloodlust I felt inside me seeping into every word. "I'll kill him!_ I'll kill_ _him!_" My words were technically meant for Sora, but my eyes locked onto Asoka's, even as I fought. From the way he was staring back at me, he knew I meant it.

I felt another powerful surge of anger. This man had left me without an explanation, completely rejected me - his own daughter- and fooled my mother - my entire family - into thinking that they could trust him. Now he was staring at me as if he had seen a spirit in the flesh. What was wrong with Asoka? Why couldn't he just stay away from me? Was he trying to mock me?

For a moment, it seemed that Sora didn't even know what to say, mumbling something uncertainly in a faint attempt at an argument. I kept fighting him, not even considering that I was probably physically hurting my new friend. That thought didn't cross my mind once; didn't even matter to me. Not then. Not there.

"Kaida, calm down!" Rei demanded from the side, pushing himself up with authority. My shadowbending was flaring, but Asoka didn't seem to notice. I was almost free of the shadowbender's grip when Rei managed to collect himself again and come to Sora's aid. The old man was twice as fast as before, his one hand darting to my wrist and the other prying the dagger out from between my unwilling fingers. Rei sternly flicked the blade to the side, where it embedded itself into the dirt far from my reach.

The two benders released their hold on me at once, now that I apparently wasn't a threat anymore. My worn-out legs didn't protest, buckling uselessly under my weight as I stumbled a few feet and fell forward onto my hands and knees. My body didn't even put up a fight as I dropped right to the ground in front of everyone. My fingers curled furiously into the loose dirt just inches from Asoka's feet. He was so close to me, now, that I could practically feel the hellish heat pulsing out of him the way it pulsed off of Iroh and Zuko. It wasn't the same, though. I could never compare Zuko or Iroh to my father. It would be an insult to them.

I didn't know what Asoka was thinking. I wasn't sure she wanted to know. Anything that ran through the mind of a killer was not something I wanted to hear. And Asoka _was_ a killer; the worst kind. He was a coward. He didn't even deserve to stand where he was, towering over me as if he was somehow worth anything more than the dirt I was still digging I nails into. Suddenly, it was like all the emotions I had shoved back over the years were rushing to the surface, pushing right at the forefront of my mind. If I wanted to, could I stand up and kill him right there?

There were footfalls from above, outside my line of vision, and I had no doubt that more people had arrived on the scene, whether due to the commotion or somebody sending for help. The street had become silent as death. No one dared speak a word. Somehow I knew, though, that everybody's eyes were on me; watching and waiting for my next move. But I _couldn't_ move. She couldn't move, I couldn't think straight, I couldn't do anything but stay there, frozen on my hands and knees like a _servant_ to the monster who hadn't moved an inch from his spot in front of me. My muscles were tightened to the point that my body was starting to shake; starting at my arms and steadily working its way out. The crowd was still speechless.

Through the violent storm of resentment inside me, I vaguely recognized that I must have looked pretty insane to everyone looking on. My unwelcome awareness of the rest of the world was slowly returning, and it was telling me that I couldn't just sit there on the ground forever, no matter how badly I wanted to just drop dead right there. And I did want to; more than anything else.

I stood up slowly, though, placing one foot at a time underneath me with a cruel deliberance that hushed the entire square all over again. My whole body continued to quiver, even as I slowly regrouped myself. All I could think was that I hated Asoka; hated him like the burning daylights for making me look like a fool, for letting my mother die, for abandoning me . . . It wasn't until I had been standing in the same spot for far longer than I had intended to, still staring at my feet, that I realized I hadn't moved yet.

"Kaida." Asoka's voice was so close, now, and I realized it was the first I'd heard it in well over a decade. The sound was a strange mixture of pain and joy that I didn't fully understand, or care to.

Fists clenched, I finally raised my eyes to meet Asoka's. My heart was pumping relentlessly as his face filled my crimson-tinted vision**. **He hadn't moved at all; not even an inch. I could feel my face contort into a look of pure loathing as his expression grew continually more pained. Finally, the tension was too much. I had to turn around, or I would do something worse. My whole body pivoted on the spot, my hair flying around and whipping my face as I began to march off toward the nearest pathway out of the square**. **People were speaking, now, but I barely heard them. They all seemed to be asking themselves the same question, anyway, and it was one I couldn't answer myself**. **I didn't care where I was going. Anywhere would have been better than where Asoka was. All I knew was that I had to get out of there _now_. My composure was falling apart; I could_ feel_ it. I was going to break down any second, and when that happened I needed to be as far away from others as I could get.

Pushing past anyone who didn't get out of the way fast enough, I attempted to move as calmly as possible as I left, my sights pinned on the street corner that went toward the ponds. I was able to keep up the mask of control only just long enough to cover that one stretch of ground before I disappeared behind the curve of the road, breaking into a run.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

Most of them didn't know what had just happened. Even I was still trying to make sense of Kaida's actions, and I knew her better than any of them. Images of the normally-relaxed shadowbender very nearly losing her mind still burned fresh in my memory. I had seen, heard and felt her wrath on the worst days, but all that was nothing compared to what I had just witnessed. It was like the girl had - just for a moment - lost herself, and I had never seen her look so much like she wanted to kill someone. Not truly; not like _that_. Suddenly, Sora groaned, snapping me back to the present.

"This was not supposed to happen," the usually-cheerful shadowbender muttered dejectedly, starting to leave in the direction Kaida had gone. "I'll go see if I can talk to-"

"No," Rei intervened, physically stopping the boy in his tracks. "Give her some time. She hasn't seen her father in almost fifteen years." Sora deflated noticeably, but I was suddenly alert.

It was her father; the one she hated. Kaida had spoken of him just a few times before, but at the end of each conversation I had been left with the heated impression that Asoka was the one person Kaida couldn't let go. Even Azula and Zhao Kaida had been able to joke about afterward, but every time she spoke about her father, her sense of humor all but vanished. I never thought we would seriously run into him, though. I hadn't even considered that her father could have been alive. Maybe it was the fact that Kaida always spoke of him as if he was dead; I wasn't sure. All I knew was that I had not expected it any more than she must have.

Subconsciously, my eyes found Asoka, who was staring off toward the street his daughter had disappeared down with a grief-stricken expression. The firebender seemed almost oblivious to the debate Rei was having with RB over what to do about him, or the concerned glances he was getting from the rest of the crowd, silently gazing after Kaida. I stooped over to pick up Kaida's dagger, which had embedded itself into the ground near my feet after Rei had finally managed to get ahold of it. Observing the object, the most that was wrong was a little dirt on the white grip. There was no blood on the blade; not yet, anyway . . .

I slipped it into my pocket quietly, making a note to let her have it back later, when she had calmed down again. For a moment, I considered going after Kaida. Rei had stopped Sora from following her, but perhaps I could sneak off and find her without the old man knowing about it. I couldn't particularly discern why, but I got the feeling that Kaida was either about to blow up or fall apart. Either way, she didn't need to be running around the empty streets by herself. She was reckless enough as it was.

Pulling myself from my internal debate, I looked up only to find Asoka watching me with a kind of keen, unsettling interest. I stared back into the firebender's deep, seemingly-endless eyes, feeling as if I was being searched through and through, but somehow I couldn't make himself look away. I was mentally falling.

Finally, Asoka did something: he nodded. The moment was only a few seconds in reality, but it was enough to make me almost too tense for comfort. I couldn't be sure exactly what the nod from Kaida's father entitled me to do, but I inexplicably found myself nodding back. At the confirmation, Asoka turned away once again, almost as if promising me that he wouldn't see anything if I left right then.

I took the hint, quickly turning and re-treading the path Kaida had taken and still trying to figure out what on earth had just happened.

.

I didn't know what I had expected to find when I caught up with Kaida; maybe a raging fire I would have to put out or a pile of rubble. She could easily have been anybody in the city, though, the way she was sitting calmly on a small bench in front of the ponds. No yelling, no destruction. Just quiet. The only thing off about her appearance was the rigidness of her posture. She sat perfectly upright on the left side of the bench; much different from her usual, careless slouch. And she wasn't moving.

I walked hesitantly toward her, as if there was some danger in moving forward too quickly or too loudly. Maybe there was. You never knew with Kaida. If she heard me coming, though, she didn't show it physically. I only hoped that she wasn't so messed up that she couldn't hear my loud, clumsy footsteps coming off the road. She always noticed everything, even when I _was_ trying.

When I reached the bench, I swung myself around the right side, sitting cautiously down next to her. She was staring out over the falsely illuminated waters with an empty kind of expression on her face. I silently continued to watch her, knowing that she would tell me what was going through her mind if I was patient enough to wait for it. As if in response to my thoughts, Kaida finally broke her statue-like pose, her jade eyes slipping shut. Something about her expression was making me start to tense up. She didn't look sure of herself. She didn't look _controlled_.

Her head was bowed as she took in a deep, quivering breath, her grip on the edge of the bench tightening almost painfully. I still couldn't open my mouth. Maybe I was afraid to speak; maybe I just knew better than to say anything to Kaida when she was like this. She seemed detached from the rest of the world; unaware of the strange looks others were giving her as they passed by. I couldn't quite remember what compelled me to do it, but something inside me couldn't stand seeing Kaida so ruined. I slowly placed my hand on her shoulder, approaching it the way I would a terrified animal. At my touch, the shadowbender looked up.

I never thought I would live to see the day tears streamed down Kaida Hotaru's face. Her ruby-rimmed eyes met mine and I could feel myself take on a dumbfounded expression. Water drops slid down her pale cheeks like a broken dam, her emerald eyes portraying nothing more than raw confusion as she stared back at me. I didn't think I'd ever seen her look more like a lost child than she did then, and it was so _wrong._ Kaida wasn't supposed to cry. She had always made it seem like an impossible thing for her; something that could never happen.

And I didn't know what to do. Azula didn't cry; had never cried. Heck, I'd probably gotten teary more often than she had. I had never had to comfort . . . well, anyone before. Kaida's eyes closed and her arms tensed again, like she was going to try to get up and leave. I frowned, not about to have it, and took her wrist before she could move an inch, pulling her toward me and wrapping my arm tentatively around her shoulder. Any other time, she would have beaten me to a pulp for it, but for just this once Kaida didn't resist. It wasn't until that moment that her control finally shattered all the way.

She let her head fall on my shoulder and broke into sobs.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**


	12. MY NEW BABYSITTER

**A/N: Wow, guys. I'm . . . well, I'm speechless. I had no idea so many people were still reading Abstraction. Some of these reviews made me want to cry! (tears of joy, of course) I will definitely be continuing to write after hearing your responses! Thank you so much! -AM**

**MY NEW BABYSITTER**

_"Perhaps our eyes need to be washed  
><em>_with tears once in a while,  
><em>_so that we can see life with a clearer view."  
>-Anonymous<em>

I awoke in my room four hours later, wondering how I was going to kill myself before any of the others could get to me.

I felt like a punching bag; a punching bag that had been lit on fire, used as a mattress and then left out in torrential rain all night. In other words, not great. My palms were shredded and filthy from falling over, and needless-to-say this headache I had wasn't going to go away any time soon. That wasn't the worst part, though. The physical damage was only temporary. The bruises would fade, the cuts would heal, and eventually I wouldn't look so disgusting. No, the worst part - the trauma that wasn't going to just heal overnight - was all in my head. My eyes were still burning mutedly from crying; or - as I liked to refer to it as - pitifully allowing my weakness to get the better of me. If I had to guess, I would say that I hadn't cried since about the age of five, and it was _not_ a welcome sensation. And, as if to bring me all the way down to rock bottom, _Zuko_ had seen the whole freaking thing.

I could probably have handled having my little breakdown in front of Iroh. He was never one I worried about judging me. And the other shadowbenders . . . well, they didn't know me well enough for it to have made any difference at all. They didn't know what kind of a person I was supposed to be; what kind of an elaborate, put-together persona I had deliberately built for myself over the years. Zuko, though, just _had_ to have been the one who went after me. I supposed I should have been grateful that someone came and found me at all, but all the embarrassment and irritation with myself for being so _weak _in front of him was crushing any thankful thought toward the firebender that I might have had otherwise. Sure, I had gotten upset in front of him before, but not like _that_. There was a fine line between the occasional pouting and what I'd just done.

I hugged my knees up under my chin, thinking about how out of control I had felt. I took pride in being able to say that I was in control of my feelings. Even under the worst circumstances, I could usually maintain at least some level of calm. It was always enough to keep everybody else wondering what was _really_ going on inside this head of mine. It was something that had gradually built up over years of surviving on my own, and being able to - more or less - fake it had kept me alive over half my life. It was a shield, a self-preservation tactic. So, why . . . why was this defense of mine suddenly failing?

I had truly never gotten like that before; not to the point where I couldn't even control what the emotions were doing to me, but I must have been far less capable of keeping myself in line than I had assumed. In truth, it frightened me. More than I was willing to admit to anybody else. In a way, maybe I was lucky Zuko had followed me the way he had. I had been afraid, at first, that he wouldn't do anything but sit there, or that he would leave when he realized that I was all but falling apart. That was his normal behavior, anyway. I wouldn't have blamed him. But despite having no intention of letting anyone know that I wasn't as strong as I liked people to believe, I didn't know what would have happened if the prince hadn't found me and made sure I didn't do anything I would have regret.

He hadn't left, though. He'd looked more than a little confused, sure, but he'd stayed there with me until I got a hold of myself, and had even - annoyingly, I told myself - walked silently with me back to the house and made sure I was okay on my own before shrugging off to find Iroh. I had hated falling apart in front of Zuko. I never wanted him to have to see me like that. Well, in truth, I never wanted _anyone_ to see me like that, but especially not Zuko. Iroh had watched me stumble through the woods, helpless, and he'd seen me lost and afraid and pretty much at my worst, but Zuko still thought I was stronger than that. Or, he _used to_, anyway, and it was all because of one worthless, traitorous firebender.

A firebender who refused to get out of my life.

My fingernails dug into my palms, still dirty from being knocked over. I knew I looked like a mess, but I didn't care. After all, I wouldn't want Asoka to see me as anything less than the pitiful mess that he created. Asoka . . . I couldn't even take the word 'father' and apply it to him. How could I even think of him as my father, after everything he'd put me through? What kind of father - what kind of _human being_ - could possibly go to sleep every night knowing that they had let their wife die and screwed up their daughter because they were too much of a coward to stand and fight? Apparently Asoka could, and did. All this time . . .

One question that had been bothering me, though, was . . . what was he doing there? Of all places, why would my father - a firebender - be in the City of Light? He wasn't a shadowbender. He shouldn't have been able to get there at all . . .

"No . . ." I rasped the thought out loud, my voice sounding just as torn up as my body.

I felt my eyes slit, and then I got it. So, that was it, then. Somebody - one of my _own people_ - had deliberately let Asoka into the City of Light. A pang of betrayal hit me square in the chest. It could have been anyone. Spirits, it could have been _everyone_. I was the only one who had seemed caught-off-guard by Asoka's presence there. Did they really not realize that Asoka was the last person they wanted in their city? Rei's earlier warning to Sora came back to me.

_"I don't like the idea of two more firebenders in the city."_

It made so much sense now, and I wished it so badly that it didn't, because it didn't just mean that he had been there before. It meant that the other shadowbenders had known; that they accepted Asoka as a part of their city. And they hadn't told me. Sora, Rei, RB . . . every single one of them had been keeping this from me the entire time. Not a single one of them had said a word to me; almost as if they didn't trust me . . .

I suddenly untangled my legs from the mass of overly-soft bed sheets I was half-buried in. My feet hit the ground with a satisfying _thump_ before pounding rhythmically on the hardwood as I stamped across my cold room and out into the hallway. I didn't even waste time trying to figure out where my dagger had gone or who had taken it, striding purposefully down the stairs and toward the door. The only thing on my mind was getting to whoever was responsible for all this and having a nice little chat with them. When I got my hands on Rei . . .

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

The City of Light had the strangest tea. I supposed it was because of the odd, otherworldly plants that grew that far underground. It wasn't bad - Kaida would have assured me that it was much better than anything I could make - it was just different. Uncle seemed to be okay with it, and that was basically the most critical test of all. We sat across from each other in a busy tea shop, dodging glances from the other shadowbenders that ranged from intrigue and curiosity to pity and apology.

I knew what they were all for; or, rather, _who_ they were all for. That same mask of empathy had been worn by every soul present in the town square only hours prior. I made the mistake, then, of closing my eyes to avoid having to look at their interested gazes. As soon as my eyes were shut, all I could see was Kaida's face; that terrible, heartbroken expression. The visual immediately made me want to open my eyes and shatter the image, but I fought against that urge. I was an emotional person. I knew that, but that didn't mean I enjoyed it. Firebenders, themselves, were rather prone to being intensely emotional, and I was every bit a firebender in that respect.

It was the cause of the emotion, however, that I failed to understand and come to terms with. I tried very hard not to judge people I didn't personally know - because I understood well enough, now, that nationality and appearance didn't mean hardly a thing - but Asoka Takahashi was quickly becoming a name that I connected with resentment.

"How was she, when you left her?"

Uncle's solemn voice broke through my black veil of silence, causing me to jump a bit at the question that I had been admittedly unprepared for.

"Asleep," I replied slowly, my eyes trained dutifully on the table; anywhere but up. "Before that, she was pretty upset." I frowned at the tremendous understatement, but found I couldn't pinpoint the right words to describe exactly how terrible she had looked just before she had passed out. Uncle nodded. He knew already.

"I spoke to Asoka after she left," the old man continued, this time startling me enough that I actually looked up in wonder at the retired general.

"About _what_?" I deadpanned. I could admit that I had a few choice words for Kaida's estranged father, but I was fairly certain that Uncle had not had _that_ sort of conversation with the firebender.

"Oh, you know," his eyes gleamed mysteriously, a small bit of humor shining boldly beneath them. "Just the weather up there. No big deal." I sighed resignedly at my uncle's secrecy, knowing I would get no more out of him. The old man paused thoughtfully for a moment. "I think Kaida should go talk to him."

The last part, he added on almost as an afterthought, but it didn't slip my notice. I laughed; a short, tired sound.

"That's not going to happen," I reasoned. If there was one thing I was sure about, that was it. Kaida didn't want to be within a hundred miles of her father, and that was _before_ she knew he was in the City of Light. Anyone who thought that she would just sit down and have a polite conversation with the man was out of their mind and - quite honestly - wasting their time. I knew Kaida well enough to see that, as of right now, a scheme like that would be more or less a lost cause.

"Not easily," Uncle amended somewhat confidently, his eyes retaining that small hint of uncharacteristic seriousness. "But I do believe that it would be good for her to hear an explanation from him." I frowned. Somehow, I couldn't fully believe that, myself. Maybe it was just that shallow, unsupported resentment inside of me that I knew only existed because this man had made Kaida cry, but - then again - Uncle always knew much more than I ever did. All I really knew was that I definitely wasn't going to be the one to try and convince the shadowbender to have this little talk with Asoka, because_ that_ would be asking for it.

The front door of the tea shop had a bell attached to it, which chimed pleasantly every few minutes when someone would enter or leave. I had become accustomed to the sound, so that was probably why I didn't notice Sora Aoi come in until he flitted over to our table, wringing his hands in what I assumed was anxiety. I gazed up with disinterest at the shadowbender, who was frowning uncharacteristically.

"Hello, Sora," Uncle greeted, noticing the boy's concerned expression. "Is everything alright?" Sora sighed.

"Probably," he began uncertainly, "But I went to check up on Kaida this morning, just to see how she was feeling . . ." My lips pressed together. I suppose it shouldn't have bothered me - after all, Sora _was_ her friend, now, and he had every right to go and visit her if he wanted to - but, once again, there was this unwanted presence of vexation in the pit of my stomach at the idea. Sora grimaced, staring down at his feet unsettlingly.

"She's- she's gone."

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

I was not prepared for how quickly my anger and fury quelled upon leaving the house. No sooner had I walked a block past Xoe's place before a sudden and unwanted wave of pointlessness overwhelmed me. What was I doing? What could I honestly tell Rei - _if _I even found him, that was? It wasn't as if he was particularly inclined to listen to somebody with a fraction of his age and authority. Getting mad at him - and the entire City of Light, for that matter - wouldn't get me anywhere. Although I didn't want to be stuck down there with Asoka, I didn't want to leave the city, either.

I let myself fall down into the grass, grinding my palms into my forehead. My thoughts were all blended together, and I couldn't get anything straight anymore.

My father was in the City of Light; my paradise. The one person in the world that I hated, and he had shown up, uninvited, to my own, personal haven. Then, what was worse, there was nothing I could do about it. No blood was going to be drawn at my hands' expense, no matter how thoroughly I believed in Asoka getting everything my mother had gotten. Meisaki had done nothing to deserve what he'd done to her. She had loved him - a firebender, of all people - and he had betrayed her when she'd needed him the most. I huffed, burying my face into my knees. That was all you got when you trusted a firebender; nothing but hatred.

The air behind me became abruptly warmer, and I didn't have to turn around to know there was someone behind me.

"Kaida, you can't just disappear like that," Zuko chided quietly. I could practically feel his gaze boring into my back.

"I don't need you to babysit me, Zuko," I snapped, swiveling around on my spot to look at the prince. My arms were crossed defensively over my chest. I expected him to glare and leave, then, but something he saw when I turned around made his eyes soften a bit. He walked around me without speaking and sat down so that he could face me, head-on. I watched him miserably as his eyes searched mine, still pulling my knees close to my chest. Finally, the prince sighed.

"You need to go home and rest," he began, though he sounded as if he already knew what my response would be. "You look terrible."

"No," I countered shortly. "I'm not tired." My chin lifted in defiance, but that feeling was back; that feeling of being completely and utterly lost. Zuko sighed again, this time more in defeat rather than exasperation.

"You're so stubborn," he said after a minute, but for some reason it didn't sound like a complaint.

I didn't know what to say, then; only that I felt like I needed to explain to somebody,_ anybody_, why I was so upset and confused. The funny thing was that, when I finally opened my mouth to tell Zuko, I found that I couldn't say anything. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I was sure of it: he already understood everything.

The prince pushed himself off the ground, disappearing from my view. I remained seated, confused, wondering if maybe he had given up trying to convince me to go home and rest. I suppose I should have known that there was no way the stubborn firebender would _ever_ give up on being right that easily. It didn't take long for his signature heat bubble to reappear directly behind me, his fingers gripping my upper arms.

Suddenly, I felt the ground disappear from underneath my feet.

Zuko hoisted me up into his arms with surprising ease and immediately began trudging back in the direction of the house without another word. I resisted instinctively, kicking and fighting to be let down, but the prince was shockingly persistent. He barely seemed to notice my frantic resistance, striding easily down the ivory-paved street toward our home.

"What are you doing, Zuko?" I shrieked. "Put me down!" He glanced down at me, his golden eyes more amused than I'd seen them in a long time.

"Fine," he replied shortly, his arms going slack beneath me. I cried out, my fingers latching automatically around his neck as his grip returned beneath me. I actually had to do a double take when I heard Zuko laugh quietly in my ear. What was with him?

"What exactly do you think you're doing, princess?" I breathed sharply, closing my eyes so I wouldn't have to look at him. My arms were still snared tightly around the prince's neck in case he decided he wanted to drop me again.

"Making you go to bed," he answered, his voice leaving no room for argument. Of course, that didn't stop me from trying.

"Since when do you care what happens to me?" I demanded, my face burning. My heart was beating double time straight out of my ribcage as Zuko pulled me closer to his chest.

"Since I realized that I'm the one who has to take care of you if you make yourself sick," he replied dully, staring straight on ahead. I was blushing furiously. Even with my eyes closed in humiliation, I could feel the attention we were drawing. Sure enough, when I chanced a small glance around us, there were people staring with amusement in their eyes from every possible direction.

"I can take care of myself, Zuko. I don't need you," I grumbled, turning my face away from the prince, but some small part of me felt like a lie had just slipped out between my lips.

I really wasn't sure how he managed to get the door open while supporting my weight at the same time, but before I knew it we were in the house. A cool rush of air hit my face – though it was still burning like a wildfire – and I felt Zuko drop me onto the couch in the main room. I gritted my teeth, still mortified that he had actually carried me across the City of Light. What did he think I was, some invalid? I was perfectly capable of walking by myself. I wasn't some sick child that he had to tend to.

Where had all this sudden concern for my health come from? I couldn't remember exactly when it had happened, but apparently Zuko had recently become my very own, self-appointed caretaker. Not that I needed one. He was acting absolutely ridiculous. Sure, maybe I was still mentally and physically exhausted, but I didn't want to lie around! I wanted to find Rei and demand an explanation immediately, and going back to sleep would not enable that to happen.

Honestly, I was so tired I couldn't think straight, but that didn't mean I needed to be babied. If I wanted to wear myself out and break my body down, then that was my decision. Maybe I really didn't want to sit down and do nothing, maybe it was just the fact that I was so wildly unused to having someone around to actually _be_ concerned about my well-being. I wasn't really sure. Thinking about it, now, Zuko was the first person I'd had around in years who knew me well enough to be worried about how I was feeling. It was a foreign, unfamiliar sensation.

The prince sauntered back into the room, trailing a blanket from my room behind him, which he ever-so-kindly flung at me as he strode back around the couch. I leered at the firebender as he settled on the floor right next to me.

"Are you my babysitter, now?" I muttered, flicking Zuko in the back of the head. He turned to glare dully at me, but didn't say anything. I groaned internally. So, that was a yes, then. "You really don't have to stay here and monitor me, Zuko." I crossed my arms tightly over my chest, turning away from him.

"I know," he answered simply.

Settling back into the couch, I wondered exactly what was going through Zuko's head. Maybe he was the sick one. I had never in a million years thought that he would be the one to drag me back to bed some random morning just because he was worried that I would over-exert myself. If I thought about it, though – really considered everything – I couldn't deny that, if Zuko had been the idiot walking around aimlessly after an emotional breakdown . . . something inside me couldn't help but admit that I would probably have done the exact same thing.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

I chuckled to myself, taking in the scene as I returned to the house that afternoon.

Kaida was asleep, lying on her side on the living room couch, her face practically buried into my nephew's hair where he was out cold against the side of the sofa. Her hand was dangling off the side, draped over Zuko's shoulder and clasping the material of the shirt he was wearing. It was undeniably a sight that the two of them would be mortified to find themselves in once they awoke, but I found it quite fitting. They may not have realized it yet, but they had a relationship unlike anything even I had ever seen.

I only wondered when they would finally figure out what everyone else had been seeing all along.


	13. TRUCE WITH AN ICE PRINCESS

**A/N: Let me be very clear. My reviewers are fantastic, including my anonymous reviewers, so it really brings me down to have to consider turning off my anonymous review option because one or a few people think that it's okay to SPAM my stories (which I have worked very hard on, by the way). I will not tolerate things such as writing "UPDATE" a hundred times as a review, nor will I comply with demands for me to update. I am very busy, I am in college, and this story (as much as I love it) will have to take second place below my grades. Your reviews (if you can even count them as such) are going to be deleted, and I expect respectful communication from now on. **

**-Ava McKenna**

**TRUCE WITH AN ICE PRINCESS**

Every day, Kaida and Sora would train together so that Kaida could master her bending.

Every day, I would sit on the opposite side of the training field with Xoe Kumaru and watch them.

It wasn't as if I missed having her around, I told himself. Certainly not. No, I told myself that talking quietly with Xoe was a good way to alleviate my stress and incomparable boredom. In all honesty, she really was quite an interesting girl, especially for being a noble. She didn't seem bothered by my presence there either, and the two of us had formed somewhat of a mutual relationship with each other.

It had all started one morning when I had found her sitting dismally across the training grounds, where we now spent our days. She had been all alone - as she typically seemed to be when she wasn't with Sora - and I had been walking around by myself as well, and, in a rare show of friendliness, I had simply walked over and asked if it was alright if I sat by her. She had been undeniably surprised at my gesture, but soon enough the mask of solitude melted away, and Xoe turned out to be someone whose company I could actually enjoy.

I had asked her several times why she came to watch Kaida and Sora train every day, but I could never get a straight answer out of the girl. She would simply shrug her shoulders up, her long, ivory braid swooshing behind her, and that would be the end of the conversation. Overall, Xoe was a very introverted person. She wasn't loud or obnoxious, she wasn't often spontaneous, she had manners like I hadn't seen since I was kicked out of the palace, and she was definitely no troublemaker. For all intents and purposes, she was essentially the polar opposite of Kaida, which explained why they didn't seem to get along very well with each other. I frowned, remembering Kaida's take on the whole thing.

_"So, what's up with you and miss icy-death-glare," Kaida demanded. Her tone was humorous, but there was some subtle irritation behind her eyes that did not escape my notice. I knew very well who she was talking about, but I didn't want to give her the satisfaction of calling Xoe by that moronic nickname, so I played stupid._

_"I don't know who you're talking about," I answered shortly. She snorted, pretending to find my answer funny, but I knew her well enough to notice that the bridge of her nose was still pinched up in frustration as she continued to speak._

_"Like Agni, you don't," she barked, her sorry attempt at a lighthearted tone of voice faltering worthlessly. "Listen, I know she's like your freaky twin sister from another dimension, but she kind of hates my guts, so you being all buddy-buddy with her-" Kaida stopped midsentence, her expression registering something like horror and shock all mixed together. "You know what? Never mind." _

_And with that, the midget walked out the front door of their house without another word on the subject, leaving me even more confused than I had been to begin with._

"I suppose you don't have to answer this if you don't want to," Xoe began, shattering the unpleasant memory. I focused on her winter eyes and the solidity of her voice to anchor my thoughts from drifting back to memories of Kaida's irritation. "But . . . exactly how did you and Kaida meet? I mean, you're not exactly a very conventional pair."

I almost smiled. She was right, of course. We were about as unconventional as you could get in this world. My elders back in the Fire Nation would have metaphorically killed me just for being seen in the company of a 'commoner' like Kaida. It would have been considered a disgrace to my family to associate with such people. In my opinion, they were all the real disgrace.

"She sort of . . ." I bit my lip, struggling to find the words that would best conserve my dignity. I supposed that there really weren't any. "Well, she kidnapped me. She was trying to bargain for her family being held captive in the Fire Nation, but that obviously didn't go over very well . . ."

Xoe's face contorted, like she was trying desperately to bite back a grin. I sighed, my face burning. Honestly, if I had to tell that story to people for the rest of my life . . . Over on the other side of the practice field, Kaida performed a shadowbending set perfectly. She squealed in delight, practically tackling Sora. I huffed, turning back to Xoe.

"How about you?" I inquired, turning the question around in an effort to distract myself. "You seem to know Sora pretty well." Xoe smiled a little, but her eyes were averted from the training session as well.

"He's my best friend," she said simply. For a minute or two, she said nothing else on the subject, and I thought that the conversation would end there, but suddenly Xoe continued with a voice quieter than before. "We met in school, in the Shadowbending Academy. He had the misfortune of getting paired up with me on the first day." She bit her lip, now, masking a smile at the memory. "He wasn't always a great shadowbender, like he is now. He was quite terrible when we were in school together."

Xoe's expression was sad, as if something about the tarnished memory was somehow painful for her. Her pale lips still curved into a halfhearted smile, but her eyes weren't behind it, and neither was her solemn, longing voice. There was no misunderstanding it. Xoe Kumaru missed this awkward, younger version of Sora. She cared, I realized, a lot more than she was willing to let on.

"So, you shadowbend well?" I began, eager to distract her from those thoughts that were putting that much-too-old expression on her porcelain face. Xoe nodded.

"My family would have nothing less," she started, her eyes still hinting that she was somewhere else mentally. Suddenly, the girl smiled, but there was no joy behind the action. "I'm a noble," she said bluntly. "I was expected from the day I was born to make a fine shadowbender. Anything short of perfection would have looked bad on the Kumaru family." I understood, now. My father and my grandfather had both been the same way with me, except I wasn't naturally a gifted bender. That title belonged solely to my sister.

"I know the feeling," I assured her. "My elders always expected too much of me."

"When I was little," Xoe confided, "My parents would make me take one-on-one lessons with Rei Bouta." The shadowbender smirked a bit. "I always hated the extra practice because all my friends would be out playing, and I just had to sit around and get lectured on my lack of interest. Then, when the Boutas started bringing Asoka down here, my family insisted that I take culture lessons from him." Her powdery-white nose wrinkled with distaste as my interest suddenly and inexplicably skyrocketed at the mention of Kaida's father.

"Was he a bad teacher?" I inquired, surprisingly eager to hear more about the mysterious man.

"Not at all," Xoe answered immediately, her cerulean eyes registering shock. "Asoka is one of the best mentors I've ever had, but it was just one more useless thing taking up my freedom. Asoka, himself, is a very kind and interesting man." I huffed.

"I've never heard that side of the story," I muttered doubtfully. Xoe sighed, gazing back toward Kaida in understanding.

"Kaida has every right to be confused; even a bit upset," she accommodated thoughtfully, "But she needs to talk to her father about things . . . I know there's a lot she doesn't understand. There's a lot of the story that no one ever told her."

I gazed at Xoe quizzically. A lot of the story? What story? Was Asoka going around telling the entire City of Light about his past; about Kaida's? That didn't sit well with me for some reason. I felt illogically like such a thing would be invading Kaida's coveted privacy, and - even more confusing to me - the strange, inexplicable urge to shield her from the world's prying curiosity.

I had always known Kaida to be the kind of person who shouldn't be bothered for answers. If she ever wanted me to know something, she would always tell me without having to be asked. That was something I had understood about her from day one. Yet, some part of my mind was still convinced that she needed to be protected from her curious onlookers. It was an emotion that I had yet to fully make sense of.

"Hello, Kaida," Xoe said evenly, once again shattering my thoughts.

I looked up to see the very girl not five feet away from us, now. She had a strange, determined look in her eyes, which should have been my first cue to high-tail it out of there, but as of then I was strangely oblivious. Kaida made no response to Xoe's greeting, instead bypassing us both with a rapturous grin. I was suddenly yanked from my spot on the ground by the back of the collar, watching the distance grow between myself and Xoe, who had a mortified expression on her face, now.

"Spirits," I coughed, gasping for precious air as the psychotic shadowbender dragged me away from the training grounds. "What the heck, Kaida?" The insane midget laughed maniacally behind me, but made no attempt to answer me. Instead, once we were clean out of sight of Xoe and Sora, she finally let go, almost sending me crashing to the ground once again. I stared at the girl, livid, while she smirked up at me, her fists planted firmly on her hips.

"Come on," she instructed, seemingly delighted. "We're going to the park."

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**

To be totally honest, I wasn't sure what had compelled me to drag Zuko to the park with me. Originally, I had intended - and was completely content with - going by myself after the lesson was over, but I had seen Zuko, sitting over there by Xoe, completely engrossed in conversation with her about lord-knows-what, and it sort of just . . . happened. I wasn't about to question the spontaneous gesture. Besides, who wanted to sit around and over-think things? Maybe Zuko did, but that sort of thing only gave me a headache.

The park, as it happened, was right on the north side of the ponds where I'd had my little breakdown just over a week ago. I frowned as the memories I had been trying to suppress returned to me in floods. I hadn't seen Asoka at all since the incident, either, though several people had tried to tell me that I should talk to him about 'things.' I scoffed. There really wasn't anything to talk about. He was a coward, he had destroyed my family, and - in all honesty - he needed to just leave, already. I didn't want to hear any of his sorry excuses or meaningless apologies, especially not now, when I actually had my life somewhat in order for once. I didn't need him ruining that.

I took a deep breath. No, I wouldn't let one man spoil my happiness. I had a new hope, new friends, a great teacher, people I could rely on . . . my eyes fell on Zuko. He turned his ocher gaze back at me as we walked, and, for a moment, my train of thought completely derailed. I suddenly couldn't remember where my mind had been headed just seconds prior. The prince's eyebrows went up fractionally.

"What is it?" he asked, his voice surprisingly gentle. I immediately shifted my eyes down toward my feet, breaking the tension.

"Do you still love your father, even after everything he's done to you?" That was not why I had been lost in his firelight eyes just then, but regardless it still worked as an excuse. I'd wanted to ask him that question, anyway. Now, Zuko looked down too, but in thought rather than embarrassment. He didn't respond for a minute or two, and in that time he stopped, lightly pulling my arm down for me to sit with him on the grass.

"Yes," he answered finally, once we were settled. I simply nodded, looking up at him mutely. "Why do you ask?" I hesitated, but then figured that I would end up talking to him about it sooner or later. Avoidance really was futile.

"Everyone keeps telling me that I should go talk to Asoka, but . . ." I trailed off, pressing my lips into a hard line at the thought.

"You don't want to," Zuko guessed. It was not a question, but a statement, rather. He knew me too well to have not figured it out.

"Right," I sighed, closing my eyes tightly. "Mostly I just want him to disappear and never come back into my life again. Ever." There was a silence between us then that was only filled by the sounds of children playing around us in the small park and other people having their own quaint conversations with one another. It felt like the real world for a moment. I heard the prince shift slightly before he spoke.

"I'm not saying that you should or shouldn't try to make amends with your father," Zuko began slowly, carefully choosing his words, I could tell. "But I do know that, one time, I really thought I hated somebody. A lot." He gazed away from me, but his eyes smirked. "And they turned out to be pretty great."

I couldn't think of a single, coherent thing to say. Instead, I simply studied Zuko - my mind bewildered - for a really long time and secretly hoped that he meant it.

**A-B-S-T-R-A-C-T-I-O-N**


End file.
